(9 Dec 2005) SHOTLIST
1. Wide of US State Department Spokesman Adam Ereli walking to podium
2. SOUNDBITE (English) Adam Ereli, US State Department spokesman:
"These latest remarks, which we've seen reports of, are clearly both appalling and reprehensible. They certainly don't inspire hope among any of us in the international community that the government of Iran is prepared to engage as a responsible member of that community. And they are again part of what appears to be a consistent pattern of rhetoric that is both hostile and out of touch with the values that the rest of us in the international community live by. "
3. Cutaway of reporters at briefing
STORYLINE
Iran's hard-line president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who once called for Israel to be "wiped off the map," again sparked a barrage of international criticism on Thursday, saying the Jewish state should be moved to Europe and questioned whether the Holocaust took place.
Both Israel and the United States cited Iran's hostility toward Israel as a reason why Iran's Islamic cleric-run regime must be prevented from developing nuclear weapons.
The United States denounced his comments as "appalling and reprehensible."
The US State Department spokesman Adam Ereli said on Thursday that the comments didn't "inspire hope among any of them in the international community that the government of Iran is prepared to engage as a responsible member of that community."
"And they are again part of what appears to be a consistent pattern of rhetoric that is both hostile and out of touch with the values that the rest of us in the international community live by," he added.
Ahmadinejad has been unapologetic about taking Iran on a more openly defiant course, insisting on Iran's right to develop its nuclear programme, which it insists is peaceful, and often using rhetoric that throws back to the 1980s heyday of the Islamic Revolution.
But he has alienated even some conservative allies in Iran, who feel he is taking a go-it-alone stance in domestic politics and hurting Iran abroad with his comments.
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