Tehran - Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Thursday dismissed Western allegations of discriminating religious minorities and said that all minorities were part of the "grand Iranian family," the news network Khabar reported.

"The enemies (of Iran) play some games by claiming discord between Iran and religious minorities but these games will have no impacts as we are all part of the grand Iranian family," Ahmadinejad said in a meeting with the parliament deputies representing the religious minorities in Iran.

The religious minorities include Christian Armenians, Zoroasters, Assyrians and Jews and are acknowledged by Iran whose majority follow the Shiite sect of Islam.

The Bahai religious sect however does not belong to the acknowledged categories.

There have several times been charges by the West of discriminatory policies by Iran towards religious minorities which Ahmadinejad categorically denied.

"The religious minorities in Iran enjoy the same rights because eventually all of us are Iranians," the president said.

The minorities also have five seats in the parliament, two for Armenians and the remaining three for Zoroasters, Assyrians and Jews.

The Jews have the biggest challenge in Iran due to Iran's anti-Israeli stance and the president's tirades in the last three years against the Jewish state and his denial of the historic dimensions of the Holocaust during the Second World War.

Tehran even hosted a Holocaust conference in December 2006 which was attended by renowned neo-Nazi and anti-Semitic personalities.

While terming the conference as an insult, the Jewish society in Iran said that it was well known in Iran that Jews were quite sensitive as far as the Holocaust was concerned and that questioning this historically proven fact by the system made them quite upset. (dpa)