Iran: We'll host conference on h0Ɩ0cαųst

Tehran says it will sponsor conference to examine scientific evidence supporting h0Ɩ0cαųst, dismissing it as exaggerated. Foreign Ministry spokesman: h0Ɩ0cαųst is not a sacred issue one cannot touch

9.03.06, 12:48  

Iran said Sunday it would sponsor a conference to examine the scientific evidence supporting the h0Ɩ0cαųst, dismissing it as exaggerated.

The decision came as UN Secretary General Kofi Annan raised concerns with Iranian officials over an exhibition of cartoons about the h0Ɩ0cαųst in Iran's capital, Tehran.

Hard-line President Ahmoud Ahmadinejad has called the nαzιs' slaughter of 6 million Jєωs a myth and said Israel should be wiped off the map or moved to Germany or the United States. His remarks prompted a global outpouring of condemnation.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi said both opponents and proponents of the existence of the h0Ɩ0cαųst could participate in the conference.

"God willing, a conference on the h0Ɩ0cαųst will be held in the autumn. The h0Ɩ0cαųst is not a sacred issue that one can't touch," he told reporters. "I have visited the nαzι camps in Eastern Europe. I think it is exaggerated."

Asefi did not disclose where the h0Ɩ0cαųst conference would be held, nor who would attend. Iran first raised the possibility of the conference in January.

Annan: Avoid anything that incites hatred

Annan brought up the exhibit, which opened in response to Muslim outrage over the Prophet Muhammad caricatures, in talks Saturday with Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki, said Annan's spokesman Ahmad Fawzi.

Annan told Mottaki "we should avoid anything that incites hatred" according to Fawzi.

The h0Ɩ0cαųst cartoon exhibit opened last month at Tehran's Caricature House, with 204 entries from Iran and abroad.
 
The cartoons were submitted after the exhibit's co-sponsor, the Hamshahri newspaper, said it wanted to test the West's tolerance for drawings about the nαzιs' mass murder of European Jєωs during World War II. The entries on display came from nations including United States, Indonesia and Turkey.

Israel considers Iran a threat and has refused to rule out military force to destroy Iran's nuclear program. Iran has said its nuclear program is intended only to generate electricity, but western countries suspect the country is trying to build an atomic bomb.