Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad Starts a Blog

Posted on August 13, 2006

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has started a blog at www.ahmadinejad.ir that can be read in Persian, Arabic, English and French. Reuters reports that the blog asks visitors in a poll if they think the U.S. and Israel are trying to start a new World War.

As well as promising a better life to the poor, Ahmadinejad has sought to bolster support by refusing to bow to what he says is Western pressure to stop Iran's civilian nuclear program. The West says Iran is building an atomic bomb.
His defiance in the stand-off with the West has often played well in the Muslim world, where many are angered by U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East.
Analyst Saeed Laylaz said the site -- available in Persian, Arabic, English and French at www.ahmadinejad.ir -- may be seeking to win support from abroad.
"Do you think that the U.S. and Israeli intention and goal by attacking Lebanon is pulling the trigger for another world war?" the president asks visitors to the site, offering them the choice to vote 'yes' or 'no'.
Ahmadinejad describes how in the first grade at school -- for those aged about seven -- he read newspapers with the help of adults about how the then shah of Iran gave Americans living in Iran immunity from prosecution under Iranian laws.

Ahmadinejad admits that his blog is too long. His first post was over 2,300 words. He writes in his blog that he hopes to write shorter entries in the future.

I will continue this topic later on as it took long in the beginning. From now onwards, I will try to make it shorter and simpler.
With hope in God, I intend to wholeheartedly complete my talk in future with allotted fifteen minutes.

Hopefully, Ahmadinejad did not use any banned words in his first blog entry.