Earlier, at the same conference, he said, "Usury, which is entrenched in the capitalist system, is perhaps the main reason why the system has gone bankrupt. It is a way of accumulating capital without working. Usury, according to the Koran, is fighting with Allah."
Ahmadinejad made no mention during his speech about Iranian nuclear ambitions -- and international attempts to contain them -- nor about recent unrest in Iran brought about by public perception that the Iranian presidential election was rigged.
In a state-of-the-nation speech that many see as critical of his mentor Vladimir Putin, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev is calling for democratic economic reforms and an end to rampant corruption that has plagued the Russian system for decades.
In this, his second state-of-the-nation speech, he is expected to try to distance himself from Putin and the failed policies that have ruled Russia in the past. Much of his speech was outlined in a September article Medvedev penned on the internet.
In the article, the president was scathing about what he called the country's primitive economy and its humiliating dependence on oil, gas and other raw materials.
He went on to criticize the level of corruption and the weakness of democracy in the country.
Now, he said, was the chance to prove that Russia could develop in a democratic way.
These remarks are not going to be popular in the Russian government, although they may find support among the Russian people.
According to the world's leading gold mining company, the world is running out of gold -- portending higher prices in coming years.
"Production peaked around 2000 and it has been in decline ever since, and we forecast that decline to continue. It is increasingly difficult to find ore," said Aaron Regent, president of the Canadian based Barrick Gold Corporation, the world's largest gold mining company.
"There is a strong case to be made that we are already at 'peak gold'."
Regent said that gold production has fallen roughly 10 million ounces per year over the last decade. Ore that produced about 12 grams of gold per ton in 1950, now produces only about 3 grams per ton.
The news does not bode well for Central banks that continue to print money -- money backed by no reserves. The continued growing scarcity for gold will drive prices ever higher in coming months and years.
The Cuban economy, ever in crisis, has forced the government to resort to "extreme measures" to curb energy use, and to avoid being forced into mandatory energy blackouts of its citizens.
"The energy situation we face is critical and if we do not adopt extreme measures we will have to revert to planned blackouts affecting the population," said a recent government communique.
"Company directors will analyze the activities that will be stopped and others reduced, leaving only those that guarantee exports, substitution of imports and basic services for the population," said another government edict.
The directives follow government warnings in the summer that too much energy was being used and blackouts would follow if consumption was not reduced.
All provincial governments and most state-run offices and factories, which encompasses 90 percent of Cuba's economic activity, were ordered in June to reduce energy use by a minimum of 12 percent or face mandatory electricity cuts.
According to government figures imports are down 30 percent for the year -- possibly caused by the government suspension of many of its debt obligations, and its freezing of the bank accounts of foreign companies doing business in Cuba.
But they have free healthcare.
The US Ambassador to Afghanistan, Karl Eikenberry, appointed to that post by President Obama in April, apparently opposes the surge of American troops into that country -- an administration policy endorsed by the president last March.
Expressing concern about corruption in Afghanistan, he said it was "not a good idea" to send substantially more soldiers, the BBC has been told.
The diplomatic dispatch appears to be a dramatic and last-minute intervention by the ambassador, says BBC Washington correspondent Adam Brookes.
After weeks of indecision, this new position from Eikenberry gives the president cover to postpone any decision on troop levels for additional months -- making, many feel, the situation on the ground in Afghanistan all that more dangerous for our troops.
Recent comments