Updated 00:10 a.m. Moscow Time
UNITED NATIONS, September 25 (RIA Novosti) - Non-peaceful interference by the West in the developments in the Middle East and Central Asia have fueled violence and extremism in the region, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said Wednesday.
"The strategic blunders of the West in the Middle East, Central Asia, and the Caucuses have turned these parts of the world into a haven for terrorists and extremists," Rouhani said in an address to the UN General Assembly in New York.
"Military aggression against Afghanistan and Iraq and improper interference in the developments in Syria are clear examples of this erroneous strategic approach in the Middle East," he stressed.
As aggression and occupation target the lives of ordinary people, they result in "different adverse psychological and behavioral consequences" that are today manifested in the form of violence in the Middle East and North Africa, the Iranian president said.
“Violence is currently being spread to other parts of the world like a contagious disease,” Rouhani underlined.
The Iranian president added that attempts to force democracy on other countries are wrong by their nature.
“We have always believed that democracy cannot be transplanted from abroad; democracy is the product of growth and development; not war and aggression. Democracy is not an export product that can be commercially imported from the West to the East. In an underdeveloped society, imported democracy leads only to a weak and vulnerable government,” Rouhani concluded.
The Iranian leader called on the world to unite against the threat posed by the extremists or “tomorrow the world will be safe for no one.”
