U.N. Votes in Favor of Imposing ‘Toughest Sanctions Ever’ on Iran

Here’s President Barack Obama’s take on the stringent new sanctions the U.N. Security Council voted Wednesday to impose on Iran: They’re “the toughest sanctions ever faced by Iran.” Right, now here’s Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on the same topic: The sanctions are like a “used handkerchief that should be dumped in a garbage can.” –KA

CNN:

“They cannot harm the Iranian nation,” he said, according to the semi-official Iranian Students News Agency.

The vote was 12-2, with Lebanon abstaining. Brazil and Turkey opposed the sanctions — the fourth set of measures to try to rein in Iran since 2006.

“True security will not come through nuclear weapons,” Obama said. He called Iran the only signer of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty “that cannot convince the IAEA that its nuclear program is intended for peaceful purposes,” referring to the U.N.’s International Atomic Energy Agency.

But the Iranian ambassador to the United Nations blasted the vote.

Read more