Iran Focus
March 6, 2006
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Tehran, Iran, Mar. 06 – Former German Chancellor Helmut Kohl reportedly told Iranian businessmen in Germany that he agreed with statements by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad that the Holocaust was a “myth”, the semi-official Jomhouri Islami reported on Monday.
The government-owned daily wrote that at a dinner gala with Iranian hoteliers and entrepreneurs, Kohl said that he “heartily agreed” with Ahmadinejad’s remarks about the Holocaust.
“What Ahmadinejad said about the Holocaust was in our bosoms”, the former German chancellor was quoted as saying. “For years we wanted to say this, but we did not have the courage to speak out”.
Ahmadinejad caused an international furor last year when he publicly declared that the Holocaust was a “myth” and threatened that Israel must be “wiped off the map”.
His comments were supported by senior Iranian officials, including Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and former president Ayatollah Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani.
The country’s state-run media have systematically defended the position of the Iranian president and given extensive coverage to historians and “experts” who deny the Holocaust took place.