TEHRAN, Feb. 25--President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Sunday opposition to Iran’s peaceful nuclear program is opposition to know-how and industry, and confrontation with the achievements of the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
Making the remark in a conference of the Islamic Republic of Iran Police on Sunday, Ahmadinejad noted that the Iranian nation has access to nuclear fuel production and threats and pressures of enemies cannot hinder the process, IRNA reported.
“Enemies are concerned about Iran’s enrichment activities. They fear that their hegemony will be broken if Iran were to gain access to nuclear technology. That’s why they are pressuring us,“ he said, adding that some people, instead of confronting the enemies, are exerting pressure on the Iranian nation not to resist.
“With the efforts of the government and support of the nation, enemy plots will be foiled and betrayers would be defeated.“
Ahmadinejad further said the Iranian nation is not afraid of pressures and threats.
“Our way is clear and we will advance the policy devised by the leader of the Islamic Revolution,“ he said.
He pointed out that various countries have increased economic cooperation with Iran, although enemies wanted to harm the economy by reducing world oil prices.
In a related development late on Saturday, President Ahmadinejad met with the 17-member American religious delegation, which is in town to confer with Iranian officials.
The president stressed that sustainable development is a requisite for the dispensation of justice and establishment of security, adding that global sustainable development materializes only when people have gained their real rights.
“All divine religions, Islam in particular, have come to preach peace, friendship and brotherhood for all. All divine prophets, including Jesus Christ (PBUH), encountered anti-peace and anti-justice movements in their drive to save humans and make them prosperous,“ he said.
Ahmadinejad also said arrogant powers are preventing the materialization of justice-based peace and security.
Referring to the peace-making and justice-seeking nature of the Iranian nation, he said Iranians do not hate Americans because all humans are respectable and should try to establish peace and justice across the world.
“America was the initiator of enmity against the Iranian nation. The US politicians and parties did not welcome Iranians after the 1979 Islamic Revolution. They even assassinated our political leaders and supported Saddam in imposing the war on Iran,“ he said.

The sounding rocket, which hovers 150 kilometers over the earthÕs atmosphere, is aimed at assisting the research of Iranian students and experts at universities and research centers.

TEHRAN, Feb. 25--Iran’s Aerospace Research Center has launched a sounding rocket successfully into space, an official said.
Breaking the news on Sunday, Ali Akbar Golrou, deputy head of the center for executive affairs, told Fars News Agency that this rocket was launched for educational and research purposes as well as scientific experiments within the framework of the center’s activities.
“This rocket will not be placed in the earth’s orbit and would return to earth with the help of a parachute,“ he said.
The sounding rocket, which hovers 150 kilometers over the earth’s atmosphere, is aimed at assisting the research of Iranian students and experts at universities and research centers.
Golrou denied that a missile has been launched into the space.
A sounding rocket, sometimes called a research rocket, is an instrument designed to take measurements and perform scientific experiments during its flight.

Roland Dumas

TEHRAN, Feb. 25--Visiting former French Foreign Minister Roland Dumas met with the chairman of Majlis National Security and Foreign Policy Commission Alaeddin Boroujerdi on Sunday.
Elaborating on the half-century history of peaceful nuclear activities in Iran, Boroujerdi referred to the cooperation of Iran and western nations before the 1979 Islamic Revolution, Mehr News Agency reported.
“The stoppage of such cooperation after the revolution is indicative of the West’s political approach toward Iran’s nuclear program,“ he said.
Boroujerdi hailed Iran’s capabilities in the nuclear arena in view of domestic capacities and stressed Iran’s right to access peaceful nuclear know-how.
“Based on Article 4 of the NPT (Non-Proliferation Treaty), which describes the legitimate right of member states to access nuclear energy for peaceful purposes, logic dictates that the West should observe and respect this right,“
he said.
“The 1,030-page report of IAEA, continued inspection by the UN nuclear watchdog and implementation of the NPT despite Majlis disconfirmation indicate Iran’s goodwill with regard to its nuclear activities,“ he said.
Boroujerdi noted that Iran is ready to engage other countries, including France and foreign companies as a consortium in its uranium enrichment activities and underlined the resumption of talks as a logical solution to build confidence for the international community.
Dumas, for his part, said Iran’s peaceful use of nuclear energy within the auspices of the NPT is the natural and legal right of Iran and complies with international rules and regulations.
“Uranium enrichment is Iran’s right and confidence building in the international arena will help this purpose,“ he said.
Stressing resumption of talks between Europe and Iran, Dumas said a unanimous solution should be found.

BAGHDAD, Iraq,
Feb. 25--A suicide bomber struck Sunday outside a college campus in Baghdad, killing at least 41 people and injuring dozens as a string of other blasts and rocket attacks left bloodshed around the city.
Most of the victims were students at the college, a business studies annex of Mustansiriyah University that was hit by a series of deadly explosions last month. At least 46 people were injured in Sunday’s blast, AP reported.
The suicide attacker detonated a bomb-rigged belt near the main entrance to the college, where students were resuming midterm exams after the two-day weekend in Iraq. Police said that guards confronted the bomber as he tried to enter the college grounds.
The school is in a mostly Shiite district of northeast Baghdad, but does not limit its enrollment to that group. The main campus of Mustansiriyah University, located about 1 1/2 miles away, was the target of twin car bombs and a suicide blast last month that killed 70
people.
Iraq’s Prime Minister Nuri Al-Maliki on Sunday blamed Al-Qaeda for a deadly bomb attack on a Sunni mosque, saying the blast proved that “terrorists“ will attack anyone, regardless of their sect.
A suicide tanker bomb exploded outside a mosque in the western town of Habbaniyah on Saturday as worshippers were leaving, killing at least 40 people and wounding more than 60, a local medical official said, AFP reported.
“Al-Qaeda committed a new terrible massacre resulting in the deaths of dozens of civilians as they finished prayers at a mosque in Habbaniyah,“ Al-Maliki said in a statement released by his office.
“They don’t value holy prayer nor worshippers nor even a mosque,“ he added.
Suicide bomb attacks on civilian targets have become a hallmark of Sunni extremist assaults on Iraq’s Shiite majority, and it is relatively unusual for such a strike to target Sunni worshippers.
Al-Maliki was at pains to stress that the attack should not be seen as sectarian in nature.

NABLUS, Occupied Palestine, Feb. 25--Dozens of Israeli jeeps and armored vehicles raided the West Bank city of Nablus Sunday and placed tens of thousands of Palestinians under curfew.
The army said troops had on Saturday, at the start of the operation to arrest suspected militants, uncovered an explosives laboratory in the city and that soldiers had been shot at in several places and returned fire.
No injuries were reported on either side, AP reported.
About 80 jeeps backing several bulldozers entered the city, witnesses said. The bulldozers pushed rubble into piles on main roads to make them impassable, they said.
Troops placed about 50,000 people under curfew in the center of Nablus and closed the main entrance to the city, witnesses said.
Jeeps blocked entries to two main hospitals in the city, said a doctor, Ghassan Hamdan.
Schools and a university in the city announced that they had canceled studies due to the curfew.