Ahmadinejad riles West but woos Iran's poor

By Edmund Blair

TEHRAN (Reuters) - His speeches cause outrage in the West and critics at home say his economic policies are failing, but President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad still rallies Iran's poor with his common touch and promises of state handouts.

Since his surprise election win in 2005, Ahmadinejad has rarely missed a chance to berate the West for trying to halt Iran's nuclear progress -- three times in as many years taking his message to the United Nations in New York.

Monday's speech at New York's University of Columbia may have prompted laughter of disbelief when Ahmadinejad, 50, said Iran had no homosexuals but his readiness to push Iran's atomic cause on American soil wins plaudits from backers at home.

"I thank the president, who by using logical methods, defended the Iranian nation's right in the heart of global arrogance," MP Ali Abbaspour Tehrani told ISNA news agency news, using a term for America often employed by Iranian officials.

Western diplomats say the president's self-confidence on the world stage is a feature of meetings behind closed doors, which some say tend to involve one-sided lectures about the failings of the West from the son of a blacksmith.

He brushes aside Western charges Iran is seeking atomic bombs, saying it has no desire or need for such weapons. He says Iran is no threat to Israel, while predicting its destruction.

However, while Ahmadinejad is a vocal opponent of U.S. policies, ultimate responsibility for shaping Iran's nuclear policy lies with Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Yet his support in Iran comes less from a readiness to take on the U.S. superpower with verbal assaults and more from populist pledges to share out Iran's oil and gas wealth more fairly, especially in regions that felt neglected by the state.