Who is "part of the problem," Mr. Cameron?

Recently British PM David Cameron, even while encouraging Iran to help deal with ISIS, couldn't resist taking a shot at the country. In his UN speech, he stated superciliously that Iran can be "part of the solution, not part of the problem." Iran's president, Hassan Rouhani, took umbrage, declaring the remark "wrong and unacceptable." A spokeswoman for Iran's foreign ministry, Marzieh Afkham, was rather more caustic: “The speech by the British prime minister at the UN general assembly shows the perpetuation of the egocentric attitude of a government which has a history of [causing] trouble in our region.”

The lady has a point. Britain does have a long history of making trouble in the Middle East, particularly for Iran. In the 20th century it invaded Iran twice. In the 1950s, it collaborated with the U.S. in overthrowing Iranian democracy. Most recently, it participated in the coalition that invaded Iran's neighbour, an invasion that ultimately lead in no small part to the creation of ISIS.

Britain has complained about the possibility of Iran developing nuclear weapons while hypocritically possessing nuclear weapons itself for no apparent reason but to strut on the world stage. Might we believe it is more responsible as a nuclear power than Iran would be? Well, Iran hasn't invaded anybody in two centuries while Britain has invaded other people all over the map, including Iran, fairly regularly during the same period.

It would seem, Mr. Cameron, that your country is rather more a part of the problem than Iran.