Iran Presides Over NAM Meeting In New York

New York, March 18, IRNA – The monthly meeting of the coordinating office of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) was presided by Iran’s permanent representative to the United Nations (UN) Gholam-Hossein Dehqani here. Dehqani as head of NAM Coordinating Office briefed the participants on his activities. He also briefed the NAM member-states about the programs for holding the upcoming meeting of NAM foreign ministers in Algeria. The Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) is a group of states which are not formally aligned with or against any major power bloc. As of 2012, the movement has 120 members and 17 observer countries. The organization was founded in Belgrade in 1961, and was largely conceived by Indiaˈs first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru; Indonesiaˈs first president, Sukarno; Egyptˈs second president, Gamal Abdel Nasser; Ghanaˈs first president Kwame Nkrumah; and Yugoslaviaˈs president, Josip Broz Tito. All five leaders were prominent advocates of a middle course for states in the Developing World between the Western and Eastern blocs in the Cold War. The phrase itself was first used to represent the doctrine by Indian diplomat V. K. Krishna Menon in 1953, at the United Nations. The 16th NAM summit took place in Tehran, Iran, from 26 to 31 August 2012. Representatives from over 150 countries were scheduled to attend.[10] Attendance at the highest level includes 27 presidents, 2 kings and emirs, 7 prime ministers, 9 vice presidents, 2 parliament spokesmen and 5 special envoys. At the summit, Iran took over from Egypt as Chair of the Non-Aligned Movement for the period 2012 to 2015. The 17th Summit of the Non Aligned Movement is to be held in Caracas, Venezuela, in 2015./end