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Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's Week in NYC Featured Heavy Security, Secret Meetings and a 9/11 Rant

By Adam Nichols | September 26, 2010 10:45am | Updated on September 27, 2010 7:01am
Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad arrives for the 64th session of the United Nations General Assembly at United Nations headquarters.
Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad arrives for the 64th session of the United Nations General Assembly at United Nations headquarters.
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AP Photo/David Karp

By Adam Nichols

DNAinfo News Editor

MIDTOWN — Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's six-night stay in the country he says he hates was filled with secret meetings, confrontations in hotel bars, fear of assassination and one controversial rant about 9/11 the United Nations.

Ahmadinejad suggested on Thursday that America was to blame for the Ground Zero terror attacks.

The iranian president camped out at the Hilton Manhattan East, on 42nd Street during his stay. His entourage took up over six floors, according to the New York Post. That's 90 rooms, 20 of which were just for security. Bulletproof glass covered the hotel's regular windows.

The Iranian leader never stepped foot in the hotel lobby, leaving and entering through an employee entrance, the Post reported. A white tent covered the street, providing a tunnel from the hotel to his vehicles to prevent Ahmadinejad from appearing to the public.

He shared a secret meal with militant Louis Farrakhan and members of the New Black Panther Party at the Warwick Hotel on West 54th Street, and avoided a scene with a furious women in his hotel bar.

The woman raised the suspicion of his security detail as she drank. As eight guards surrounded her, she jumped to her feet, yelling: "You stoned my sister! You're murderers!"

Ahmadinejad wouldn't even take a chance with his food. Specially prepared lamb, kebabs and basmati rice were bused in from a Persian restaurant.

A source told the Post it made "the whole hotel stink like Hell."