Ahmadinejad says new UN sanctions 'illegitimate'

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Thursday called the UN Security Council an "illegitimate" body and said that any new sanctions imposed on his country would only stimulate it to be self sufficient and further develop nuclear technology. Speaking after the news that the Security Council had agreed on new sanctions against Iran, Ahmadinejad told a rally in the central city of Meibod: "These threats won't have one iota of effect on the strong will of the Iranian nation." "You (world powers) cannot force the Iranian nation to retreat" on its nuclear program, the official Islamic Republic News Agency quoted him as saying. Hours earlier the president told a gathering in the central town of Ardakan that "the Security Council today has no legitimacy."