Egypt Comments at NAM on Syria Prompt Sharp Rebuttle from Assad Regime

Syria came under verbal attack on Thursday at a conference of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) in Iran.

Egypt’s president called the Syrian uprising a “revolution against an oppressive regime.”

Syria countered by saying such remarks incite continued bloodshed in Syria.

Anchor Marco Werman speaks with Time Magazine’s diplomatic correspondent, Jay Newton-Small who is attending the summit.

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Marco Werman: I’m Marco Werman. This is The World. Egypt’s new President created a diplomatic stir today. Mohamed Morsi was on the first official visit to Iran by an Egyption leader since 1979. He was attending a summit of the Non-Aligned Movement or NAM. Morsi has been serving as the current head of NAM and was handing the baton off to Iran. In his remarks, Morsi called the uprising in Syria quote a revolution against an oppressive regime. That went over like a lead balloon, considering Syria is Iran’s closest Arab ally. Jay Newton-Small is diplomatic correspondent for Time Magazine and is attending the NAM Summit. She joins us now from Tehran. So Syria’s delegation walked out of the conference room, I gather, when the Egyptian president began speaking. What was Iran’s reaction to all this?

Jay Newton-Small: It was really striking that Iran’s response to Morsi’s comments was essentially dead silence. You saw Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who’s the Iranian President, speak after Morsi had and basically said nothing and didn’t even mention the word Syria. Didn’t mention anything about the crisis and the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khomeini spoke earlier and also did not mention Syria. So it really has become the kind of ugly step-child of the conference and this conference which Iran had hoped would go so well and really focus on its own nuclear program and the sanctions being held against it and now the entire conversation’s been kind of hijacked by Syria.

Werman: Was it surprising that Mohamed Morsi would take issue with Syria, and by extension Iran as well?

Newton-Small: No. I mean, it’s I think Morsi really has been trying to underline to the Iranians that he isn’t going to be a pawn to their messaging here and earlier in the week the Iranians had been pushing this kind of resolution as part of the declaration language. The NAM declaration from the summit that would include pretty strong paragraphs on Syria being allowed to negotiate an end to this crisis by themselves and what Morsi basically said is I’m not going to go along with that kind of the language and a lot of the Sunni countries really objected to the language when it was floated and it ultimately ended up taking out the language and putting in these three very bland paragraphs about how everybody hopes for peace in Syria and so I think it was partly in response to that sort of Morsi saying, Bashar Assad the president of Syria is killing Sunnis by the tens of thousands and Iran is helping him do that and so they’re not going to sort of sit idly by and let Tehran use Morsi’s attendance as if he was somehow supporting their role in Syria.

Werman: Now, Egypt wasn’t the only delegation that ruffled feathers today in Tehran. Tell us what U.N. Chief Ban Ki-Moon said.

Newton-Small: Well, Ban Ki-Moon, good for him. This has really been a conference where he’s shown his backside. Well, first of all, when the United States and Israel sort of threatened him. Saying don’t come to this conference. Don’t give validity to it. He said, “No, I’m going to go. I’m going. It’s a tradition that the Secretary General go to these kinds of conferences.” And then once he got here, he also sort of took the Iranians to task by getting up and giving this speech saying I don’t approve ever when countries threaten to annihilate other countries and I also think it’s irresponsible when they use bad language, such as when they deny the Holocaust, and that’s historically incorrect and that sort of both of which were digs at Iran because in recent days threatened to annihilate Israel and in fact just that Khomeini said that he wanted to annihilate Israel and then also has denied the Holocaust a lot of times and so it really, what I think was surprise to the Iranians who thought that again Ban Ki-Moon would be this sort of quiet presence here and then all of a sudden here he is criticizing them.

Werman: Tell us a bit more about the Non-Aligned Movement, Jay, and how it got started.

Newton-Small: The movement started in 1961 and the 25 countries that did not want to be aligned with either the United States or the Pacific Union and obviously that message has changed over the years with the end of the Cold War. It depends on what country you ask about the interpretation and the Iranians see it as a very much anti-American, anti-unilateral group, but others see it as just a group of minute countries who are looking to develop in certain ways and trade in certain ways and exchange ideas in certain ways. So it’s an interesting movement certainly and it’s actually been expanding and growing and there’s 120 nations that are no part of it.

Werman: Is the global influence meter for NAM up or down these days?

Newton-Small: Up until this point, a lot of people have sort of seen this conference as kind of growing the global influence kind of down. It wasn’t. It hasn’t created a huge stir in years past and it really hasn’t created any policies or anything that has sort of changed the world, I think. I don’t know if ever. So, I mean, it’s the kind of thing where I don’t know that it would be such a big deal if it were any other country except for Iran hosting it right at this moment and because it’s been so difficult for American journalists to get in here and it was a great reason sort of to come and see how Iran is doing and how the city is changing and sort of get in and talk to people here and see what it’s like here.

Werman: Now, there were a number of nuclear scientists and physicists who were allegedly assassinated in the last 12 months or so in Iran and apparently Iran has made a big show of this at the NAM. Tell us what’s going on.

Newton-Small: Yeah. There are these three cars that have been bombed clearly. They’re propped up sort of in front of the conference and they’re sort of at an angle.

Werman: Right.

Newton-Small: Like they’re sort of new Mazarati’s being presented to the world and it’s sort of weird, because you’re like, “What are those beat up cars doing here?” And then you read the sign underneath them and you realize that these are the cars that were three Iranian nuclear scientists died in the past year due to car bombs, which Iran accuses Israel of being behind and then sort of when you went to the classroom it was down the corridor of this enormous sort of memorial hallway of all of the Iranians killed quote unquote by terrorism in the last year. So it was really Iran trying to say the message that they’re a victim of terrorism and that when Americans or Israelis kill people and blow up people it’s all in the name of good. Whereas, when they perhaps doing something similar they get sanctions dropped on them.

Werman: Time Magazine’s Jay Newton-Small speaking with us from the Non-Aligned Movement meeting in Tehran. Thank you very much.

Newton-Small: Thank you, Marco.

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