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On show at an annual military parade on Thursday were thousands of troops and a range of hardware including six of Iran's Shahab-3 ballistic missiles -- which sported banners saying "Death to America", "We will crush America under our feet" and " Israel must be wiped off the face of the earth". The slogans prompted a diplomatic protest by European military attaches. Oooooh. Scary. The event marked the start of "Sacred Defence Week" -- the anniversary of the outbreak of a destructive eight-year war with Iraq in 1980 -- and began with another tough speech by hardline President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. "Our enemies have understood that we are very serious in defending our security," said Ahmadinejad, himself a veteran of the Iran-Iraq war. The term "enemies" is used as a reference to the United States and Israel. "Our nation wants peace, stability, justice and equality in international relations. We have always sought friendly relations with other countries. Our nation wants the well-being of other countries and will not do anything against their national interest," he insisted. "We want the Persian Gulf to be a gulf of friendship and equality," Ahmadinejad said in a speech at the parade, being staged in the south of the capital near the shrine of Iran's late Islamic revolutionary leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini and carried live on state television. But he warned that "if some want to again test what they have tested before, the flame of the Iranian nation will be very destructive and fiery." No, no, dummy. It's "Sea of Fire." Check your translation. "Relying on our nation and armed forces, we will make the aggressor regret its actions," Ahmadinejad warned, telling Iran's army to "prepare their defensive readiness" and calling for an "expansion of the defence industries and the utilisation of the latest technology". But the vitriolic anti-US and Israeli slogans on the missiles prompted the only EU diplomats present -- military attaches from the embassies of France, Italy, Greece and Poland -- to walk away in protest. "There was a common position among EU members that, if the military parade included any slogans that attacked our allies, we would leave," said a diplomat. And that's about all you'll do, too. Right? The Shahab-3 Posted by: Jackal 2005-09-22 |
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