Obama Uses UN Speech to Condemn Extremism

By Julian Borger, Guardian UK

26 September 12

President warns Iran time is running out in UN general assembly speech aimed at resetting relations between US and Arab world

resident Barack Obama today sought to reset US relations with the Arab world in the wake of anti-American riots triggered by an amateur video insulting the prophet Mohamed, that led to the death of the US ambassador to Libya, Chris Stevens.

Obama used his speech to the UN general assembly, expected to be his last major foreign policy address before the November elections, to pay a personal tribute to Stevens, highlighting the murdered diplomat's passion for Arab culture and support for democracy, and present it a model for American-Arab relations.

The president also restated the US position on the Iran nuclear programme: that there was still time for diplomacy, but not "unlimited time". He also called for the emergence of a new, democratic and inclusive government in Syria, but offered no new ideas about how the international community should help attain that goal, or how the deadlock in the UN security council over Syria might be broken.

In a landmark speech in Cairo three years ago, Obama promised a "new beginning" in the relationship between his country and the Islamic world, but that relationship is now at its lowest point since the start of the Arab spring as a result of a YouTube video clip made by an Egyptian American insulting the prophet Mohamed.

The crude 14-minute clip went viral over the summer, triggering furious anti-American demonstrations across the Middle East and the wider Islamic world.

Obama balanced condemnation of the "crude and disgusting" video, with a denunciation of the violence that it sparked and a demand for the new Arab governments to do more to defend American diplomats.

"I have made it clear that the US government had nothing to do with this video, and I believe its message must be rejected by all who respect our common humanity," Obama said. " It is an insult not only to Muslims, but to America as well. We are home to Muslims who worship across our country."

Obama rejected calls from Arab and other Islamic leaders for the YouTube video to be somehow banned, pointed to US constitutional protections of free speech and the technical impossibility of controlling such broadcasts.

"[I]n 2012, at a time when anyone with a cell phone can spread offensive views around the world with the click of a button, the notion that we can control the flow of information is obsolete. The question, then, is how we respond. And on this we must agree: there is no speech that justifies mindless violence," he said. He also criticised double standards in the protection of religion in the Middle East.

"The future must not belong to those who slander the prophet of Islam. Yet to be credible, those who condemn that slander must also condemn the hate we see when the image of Jesus Christ is desecrated, churches are destroyed, or the Holocaust is denied," the president said.

He also made clear his dissatisfaction with the reaction of some Arab governments to the wave of anti-American riots. US officials have singled out the Egyptian president, Mohamed Morsi, in this regard.

"If we are serious about upholding these ideals, it will not be enough to put more guards in front of an embassy; or to put out statements of regret, and wait for the outrage to pass. If we are serious about those ideals, we must speak honestly about the deeper causes of this crisis," he said.

Obama expressed gratitude to the government and people of Libya, after pro-American protesters seized control of the bases of the extremist militias implicated in the attacks on the US consulate in Benghazi, but he made it clear Washington did not believe all the perpetrators had been caught, and left open the option of taking direct action.

"The attacks on our civilians in Benghazi were attacks on America. We are grateful for the assistance we received from the Libyan government and the Libyan people. And there should be no doubt that we will be relentless in tracking down the killers and bringing them to justice," the president said.

Earlier, the UN secretary-general, Ban Ki-moon issued an unusually stern denouncement of security council inaction over Syria, which he called "a regional calamity with global ramifications."

"This is a serious and growing threat to international peace and security which requires security council action," Ban said. "The international community should not look the other way as violence spirals out of control."

UN officials said that Ban has become increasingly frustrated by the security council's deadock over Syria and had decided to speak out in his bluntest speech to date.

He also called for those responsibility for atrocities in Syria to be held accountable, noting "there is no statute of limitations for such extreme violence", and placing most of the blame on the Assad regime. At present, Russian and Chinese objections are blocking the international criminal court from launching an investigation into war crimes, and Ban's comments were widely seen at the UN as a direct rebuke for their obstruction of the machinery of international justice.

"Brutal human rights abuses continue to be committed, mainly by the government, but also by opposition groups. Such crimes must not go unpunished," he said. "It is the duty of our generation to put an end to impunity for international crimes, in Syria and elsewhere. It is our duty to give tangible meaning to the responsibility to protect."

The responsibility to protect was a principle adopted by the UN in the 1990s, stating that the international community to intervene to protect civilian populations when their states were unwilling or unable to do so.

Ban also had pointed words for two leaders due to speak at the same UN podium later in the week: Binyamin Netanyahu and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, calling for them to pull back from the brink of a new Middle East conflict, and to ratchet down their rhetoric.

"I … reject both the language of de-legitimisation and threats of potential military action by one state against another. Any such attacks would be devastating. The shrill war talk of recent weeks has been alarming," Ban said. "Leaders have a responsibility to use their voices to lower tensions instead of raising the temperature and volatility of the moment."

Netanyahu has been successful in displacing the Israel-Palestinian impasse from the international agenda by repeated threats to take military action against Iran. But he was warned by Ban that his government's policies in the West Bank were stoking renewed conflict.

"The two-state solution is the only sustainable option. Yet the door may be closing, for good. The continued growth of Israeli settlement settlements in the occupied Palestinian territory seriously undermines efforts toward peace. We must break this dangerous impasse," Ban said.