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WASHINGTON (CNN) -- A major United Nations anti-racism conference was thrown into further disarray Sunday when more countries joined a U.S. boycott amid concerns it was developing into a platform for attacking Israel.

Australia and the Netherlands were the latest to pull out of next week's meeting in Geneva, as a dispute gathered pace over a document said to single out Israel for its racism.

The U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay, said she was "shocked and deeply disappointed" at the boycott.

"These are truly global issues, and it is essential that they are discussed at a global level, however sensitive and difficult they may be," she said in a statement.

Washington says despite numerous redrafts of the controversial document, due to be adopted at the conference, it remains unhappy, and says it violates American principles of free speech.

Canada, Israel, Italy and Sweden have also announced they are boycotting the conference aimed at creating a global blueprint for tackling discrimination. Britain says it will attend.

Meanwhile, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad, whose past comments on the Holocaust and Israel are likely to overshadow his contributions to the debate, has reportedly confirmed his attendence.

U.S. State Department officials say redrafts of the offending document, which will reaffirm anti-discrimination commitments agreed at a 2001 meeting in Durban, South Africa, have failed to resolve outstanding issues.

America objected to the 2001 agreement -- joining Israel in walking out of the Durban meeting -- and says the current document "prejudges key issues that can only be resolved in negotiations between the Israelis and Palestinians."

Australia's Foreign Minister Stephen Smith echoed the concerns on Sunday, saying that Israel was being unfairly targeted..

"Regrettably, we cannot be confident that the Review Conference will not again be used as a platform to air offensive views, including anti-Semitic views," he said.

The United States says that despite its boycott, it "will continue to work assiduously" with all nations "to combat bigotry and end discrimination."

But the move has caused concern among anti-racism campaigners in the United States.

The Congressional Black Caucus said it was "deeply dismayed" by the decision made by the nation's first African-African president, saying it was inconsistent with administration policies.

"Had the United States sent a high-level delegation reflecting the richness and diversity of our country, it would have sent a powerful message to the world that we're ready to lead by example," a statement from the group said.

"Instead, the administration opted to boycott the conference, a decision that does not advance the cause of combating racism and intolerance, but rather sets the cause back."

I have never seen such a disgraceful event in quite a long international life.

Diplomats have walked out of a UN anti-racism conference during a speech by the Iranian president in which he described Israel as "totally racist".

Dozens of delegates got up and left, moments after two protesters wearing coloured wigs disrupted the start of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's speech.

Diplomats who remained applauded as Mr Ahmadinejad continued his address.

France said it was a "hate speech" and the US called it "vile". Some countries had boycotted the meeting altogether.

The walkout is a public relations disaster for the United Nations, which had hoped the conference would be a shining example of what the UN is supposed to do best - uniting to combat injustice in the world, says the BBC's Imogen Foulkes in Geneva.

UN dismay


Paul Reynolds
Paul Reynolds
World affairs correspondent, BBC News website

The one issue that never seems to go away when conferences of this kind are held is the Israeli-Palestinian one.

A document has been already been agreed among those governments attending and you have to read it quite closely to detect the tremors remaining from the earthquakes in discussions that went before.

But enough contentious issues remain and the result is a boycott by the US, Israel, Germany, Italy, Australia, Canada and New Zealand.

Fault lines split UN summit

The walkout by delegates from at least 30 countries happened within minutes of the start of the speech.

The officials planned to return later to participate in the rest of the conference.

One of the two protesters escorted out of the conference hall managed to throw a red clown's nose at the Iranian president, as they yelled "racist, racist" as he stood at the podium.

Mr Ahmadinejad, the only major leader to attend the conference, said Jewish migrants from Europe and the United States had been sent to the Middle East after World War II "in order to establish a racist government in the occupied Palestine".

He continued, through an interpreter: "And in fact, in compensation for the dire consequences of racism in Europe, they helped bring to power the most cruel and repressive racist regime in Palestine."

French Ambassador Jean-Baptiste Mattei said: "As soon as he started to address the question of the Jewish people and Israel, we had no reason to stay in the room," the Associated Press news agency reported.


RACISM CONFERENCE

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Mardell blog: Italy's anger at split
In quotes: Ahmadinejad's speech
In quotes: World reaction to speech

British Ambassador Peter Gooderham, also among those who left, said "such inflammatory rhetoric has no place whatsoever in a United Nations conference addressing the whole issue of racism and how to address it."

Speaking to the BBC Radio 4's PM programme, he said of the Iranian leader's accusation of Israeli racism: "That is a charge we unreservedly condemn and so we had no hesitation at that point in leaving the conference hall."

The US, Israel, Canada, Australia, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland and New Zealand had all boycotted the conference being held in Geneva, in protest at Mr Ahmadinejad's appearance.

His comments were described as "an absolute disgrace" by Israeli President Shimon Peres, attending a Holocaust Remembrance Day event in Jerusalem.

Israel had earlier recalled its ambassador to Switzerland.

Mr Ahmadinejad told a press conference after his speech that the countries boycotting the forum were showing "arrogance and selfishness".

The US Deputy Ambassador to the UN, Alejandro Wolff, said the speech was "inaccurate", as well as showing disregard towards the UN, and "does a grave injustice to the Iranian nation and the Iranian people".

Speaking at UN headquarters in New York, he said: "We call on the Iranian leadership to show much measured, moderate, honest and constructive rhetoric when dealing with issues in the region, and not this type of vile, hateful, inciteful speech."

French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner had warned that French delegates would walk out if the forum was used as a platform to attack Israel.

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Speaking after the walkout, he said: "The defence of human rights and the fight against all types of racism are too important for the United Nations not to unite against all forms of hate speech, against all perversion of this message.

"Faced with attitudes like that which the Iranian president has just adopted, no compromise is possible."

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has expressed dismay at the boycotts and the speech, saying Mr Ahmadinejad had used his speech "to accuse, divide and even incite".