An ambassador from India, on a visit Nov. 18 to a local prep school, defended his country’s support for Iran having a nuclear program despite strong reservations from one India’s top trading pa
by Philip Sean Curran, Packet Media Group
An ambassador from India, on a visit Nov. 18 to a local prep school, defended his country’s support for Iran having a nuclear program despite strong reservations from one India’s top trading partners.
His talk came days before an international agreement was reached under which Iran temporarily will suspend its nuclear program in exchange for lifting longtime sanctions against the country that have cost it millions.
”We believe that all nations have a right to use nuclear energy and nuclear technology for peaceful means,” Manjeev Singh Puri told around 400 students at Princeton Day School.
Mr. Puri, India’s deputy permanent representative to the U.N., said India has “good relations” with Iran and with Israel, one of India’s largest trading partners in Asia.
His comments are in line with official government policy. In October, India Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Russian President Vladimir Putin issued a joint statement in which the two leaders recognized Iran’s right to a nuclear program for “peaceful purposes.”
Mr. Puri, named earlier this month to be India’s ambassador to Belgium, addressed the Iran issue during a question and answer session with an audience that had listened to a wide-ranging speech.
In his remarks, Mr. Puri said that within the developing work, the U.N. is seen as “a force for good.”
The U.N., he said, is looked at as a place of “ideas for food security, ideas for doing the right thing in terms of empowerment of women, doing the right things in terms of children’s rights.
”This is the way the developing world look at the United Nations,” he said. “We look to it as a place for ideas, we look to it as a place which can do things which are for our good and we look at it as a force for good.”
Yet he said he was a “little concerned” that, in large parts of the developed world, there is a “great deal of skepticism” about the U.N. He said the world needs the international body.
Later, he offered a full-throated endorsement of globalization.
”No company would set up a call center in India or the Philippines or anywhere if it didn’t make business sense,” he said. “And none of you would interact with that company if it didn’t make business sense.”
He said “contemporary realities” are demanding change in the governance structures of the U.N. and other international organizations that include the International Monetary Fund. India, home to more than 1 billion people, has advocated for such reforms.
Touching on the environment, he said collaboration among nations is needed to address climate change.