Iran has no intention to improve ties with US: Ahmadinejad

Iran's president-elect Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Sunday that he has no intention to improve Tehran's relations with the United States as long as Washington adopts a hostile attitude towards the Islamic Republic.

"Iran will develop ties with almost all countries in the world except for the United States, for we cannot develop relations with a country which always keeps a hostile attitude toward us," Ahmadinejad told a press conference, which was his first public show as president-elect.

Ahmadinejad stressed that Iran can and will develop relations just with amicable countries. "As long as Washington keeps behaving like that, there is no need for Iran to develop ties with it."

"The Americans must totally change its mind about Iran, for example, giving up policies like economic sanctions, sabotages against the Islamic Republic and so on, then we can take into account the development of relations with them," Ahmadinejad elaborated.

Iran "does not really need" to restore relations with Washington after cutting off a quarter of a century ago, he said, adding "Iran is on a path of progress and elevation, and does not really need the United States on this path."

"The foreign policy of the government is justice, peace and co- existence, and the expansion of mutual, just relations," he stressed.

Ahmadinejad, a representative of the ultra-conservatives in Iran, defeated pragmatic former president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani with a landslide win in the ninth presidential election runoff on Friday.

His success has been viewed as a bad news for the frozen relation between Washington and Tehran due to his hardline stance.

Iran and the United States have been exchanging hostility for 26 years. Washington, accusing Iran of developing nuclear weapons and sponsoring terrorists, has labeled Iran as the "axis of evils" and imposed harsh sanctions on the country.

In return, Iran termed the United Sates as the "enemy of the Islam," calling on all Muslims to frustrate its attempt to control the Middle East.

Source: Xinhua