Ahmadinejad Met With Protests, Criticism at Columbia University

A small group of protesters gather outside Columbia University on Sunday, Sept. 23, 2007 to protest plans for Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to speak on campus tomorrow. The demonstration was organized by New York City Council Member David Weprin. (AP Photo/John Smock) (John Smock - AP)

Other protesters opposed the decision of Columbia's School of International and Public Affairs to invite Ahmadinejad in the first place, saying the school should not provide a forum for a "terrorist."

Maryam Jazini, a Fordham Law School student of Iranian descent, said, "I really don't like him, but I don't think he represents what Iranians are." Wearing a white head scarf, Jazini helped other members of Columbia's unofficial Persian Philosophy Club put up large signs saying that Iranians were among the first to condemn the Sept. 11 attacks.

Another demonstrator, Jack Orleans, had sharp words for both Ahmadinejad and President Bush. "We refuse to choose between Bush and Ahmadinejad," said large orange signs he was posting on campus.

"We can't allow our choices to be limited to Islamic fundamentalism on the one hand and the Bush administration crusading around the world for empire on the other," he said. "Humanity needs another way."

Other posters mocked the visiting Iranian president. "Bringing Sexy Back," one said under a photo of Ahmadinejad. "Nerd Alert," said another.

"The Evil Has Landed," read the front-page headline of the New York Daily News.

Commenting on the Iranian's visit, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told the CNBC cable TV channel Monday it would have been a "travesty" if he had been allowed to visit Ground Zero.

"This is somebody who is the president of a country that is probably the greatest sponsor -- state sponsor -- of terrorism, someone who is a Holocaust denier, someone who has talked about wiping other countries off the map," Rice said. "I think it would have been a travesty." She referred to statements in which Ahmadinejad dismissed the Holocaust as a "myth" and said that Israel "must be wiped off the map."

On Tuesday Ahmadinejad is scheduled to address the U.N. General Assembly. Under terms of his visit to New York City, he is not allowed to travel outside a 25-mile radius.

Ahead of his appearance, Ahmadinejad said in an interview broadcast Sunday night that Tehran has no need for a nuclear weapon and challenged claims that his country is arming Iraqi militants targeting U.S. troops.

Ahmadinejad also said that tensions between the United States and Iran, which have steadily heightened over Tehran's nuclear ambitions and support for extremists, are not headed toward a military confrontation.

"It's wrong to think Iran and the U.S. are walking towards war," he said on CBS's "60 Minutes" program. "This is psychological warfare. If you have differences of opinion, you can use logic to resolve your differences."

The hard-line leader said Iran does not need a nuclear bomb because such weapons have not guaranteed security even for superpowers. "In political relations right now, the nuclear bomb is of no use. If it was useful, it would have prevented the downfall of the Soviet Union. If it was useful, it would have resolved the problem the Americans have in Iraq," he said.

Although Iran had a secret uranium enrichment program for almost two decades, Ahmadinejad said that Iran now has "nothing to hide."

He scoffed at U.S. allegations that his country has provided deadly roadside bombs known as explosively formed projectiles to Iraqi extremists. "It's laughable for someone to turn a blind eye to the truth and accuse others," he said in the interview, taped in Tehran. "It doesn't help. And the reason that I'm smiling again is because the picture is so clear. But American officials refuse to see it."

Ahmadinejad said that instability in Iraq is "detrimental" to Tehran's regional interests.

Branigin reported from Washington.