Iran hosts intl. anti-terrorism confab

Iran is hosting an international meeting on terrorism as the country marks the anniversary of the assassination of one of the Islamic Revolution’s influential figures.

The International Conference on the Global Fight against Terrorism is scheduled to open on Saturday.

The event is expected to bring together senior officials from at least 60 countries, and representatives from several international organizations including the UN.

The two-day meeting will be kicked off with a speech by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

“This [conference] is to form a platform where different views could be expressed. Participants from different corners and parts of the world can take part in the deliberation. And the guests at the conference, the scholars, the officials… they would be going to the challenges that we have been faced,” Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister Mohammad-Mehdi Akhondzadeh told Press TV on Friday.

Akhoundzadeh, however, described the conference as only the beginning of a campaign against terrorism in the region which has been the hotbed of terrorism, namely in Afghanistan and Iraq, describing Iran as the main victim of terrorism in the region.

“And we have been the main victim of terrorist activities in the past 32 years and in the coming days we are going to commemorate the terrorist activities that took place in Iran and took the lives of many innocent Iranians.”

“That’s why it has a strong message to the international community that ‘enough is enough’. We have to put an end to this with the collective participation of all those individuals and countries who want a world free from terrorism,” he said.

Iran, having suffered a long record of the killing of its officials in bombing and other acts of terror since the 1979 Islamic Revolution regards itself as a victim of terrorism.

Large numbers of Iranians, including former President Mohammad-Ali Rajai and late Prime Minister Mohammad-Javad Bahonar are among the officials assassinated by terrorist elements.

Meanwhile, Iran prepares to commemorate the assassination of former Judiciary chief Seyyed Mohammad Beheshti, another prominent Iranian figures to fall victim to a terrorist attack.

The secretary general of the Islamic Republic Party was killed along with 72 others when a bombing attack targeted a party conference back in 1981.

In April, Iranian Justice Minister Morteza Bakhtiari said 12,000 Iranians have fallen victim to acts of terror carried out by the Mujahedin-e Khalq Organization, condemning the United States and Europe for supporting the terrorist group.

The Saturday conference plans to commemorate Pakistan’s slain former prime minister and opposition leader Benazir Bhutto.

The wife of incumbent President Asif Ali Zardari and Pakistan’s only female prime minister was assassinated in December 2007.