Iran has no interest in nuclear weapons, but will keep pursuing peaceful nuclear energy, its Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei told heads of state from developing countries in Tehran.
Iran, hosting a summit of the 120-nation Non-Aligned Movement, is hoping the high-profile event will prove Western efforts to isolate and punish it economically over a disputed nuclear programme have failed.
"Our motto is nuclear energy for all and nuclear weapons for none," Mr Khamenei said.
United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, attending the summit, had urged Mr Khamenei to take steps to prove Iran's nuclear work is peaceful.
The West suspects Iran is seeking a nuclear weapons capability, an accusation Tehran denies.
Mr Khamenei criticised the UN Security Council as an illogical, unjust and a defunct relic of the past used by the United States "to impose its bullying manner on the world".
He added: "They [Americans] talk of democracy when what they have is military intervention in other countries."
The US and Israel had frowned on the decision by Mr Ban to attend the summit but the UN chief, without naming Iran, hit out at countries which denied the Holocaust.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article