Netanyahu aims to bring Ahmadinejad to trial

JERUSALEM, Jan 21 (Reuters) Israel's opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu today said, he hoped to bring Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to international trial for incitement to genocide.

Ahmadinejad has provoked international outcry by referring to the killing of six million Jews in World War Two as a ''myth'' and calling for Israel to be ''wiped off the map''.

Speaking at a conference in Israel, Netanyahu said he and other Israelis were trying to bring the Iranian leader to the International Court of Justice.

''We are working to bring Ahmadinejad to stand trial as a war criminal for his call for genocide,'' he said.

''The 1948 universal declaration of human rights does not just prohibit acts of genocide but also deals with incitement to genocide. And according to this, we are aiming to lobby international figures.'' Netanyahu, a former Israeli prime minister, said he had already discussed the initiative with diplomats, adding that he planned to visit Britain this week to lobby lawmakers there.

''I want to call on the world, the world that did not stop the Holocaust last time, (to) stop any attempt at a future Holocaust this time,'' he said.

The UN Security Council passed a sanctions resolution on December 23 against Iran, calling for the suspension of its nuclear programme, which the West fears is aimed at making nuclear weapons.

Iran denies the charge.

Netanyahu said he was also pressing for ''voluntary sanctions'' to be imposed on Iran by Western companies.

''There is no need to wait for the United Nations until it brings to the Security Council sanctions with teeth -- if they will bring them at all,'' he said.

Ahmadinejad said today that UN Security Council resolutions against Tehran would not affect Iran's nuclear policies even if 10 more were passed.

Israel has refused to rule out pre-emptive military action against Iran along the lines of its 1981 air strike against an atomic reactor in Iraq, though many analysts believe Iran's nuclear facilities are too much for Israel to take on alone.

Israel, widely believed to have the West Asia's only nuclear arsenal, has said it will not allow Iran to acquire nuclear weapons.

Speaking last month at an international conference in Tehran questioning the Holocaust, Ahmadinejad said Israel's days were numbered.

REUTERS DKA MIR RAI1906