Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi accused America of stoking the flames of violence in Ukraine, prompting protests from Israel’s representative to the UN.
Iran's president Ebrahim Raisi gestures to the audience inside the United Nations general assembly hall-Image Source: The Guardian
Raisi claimed any Iranian-made drones hitting Ukrainian cities had been sold before the war started and said he was in favour of peace in Ukraine.
His speech sparked the Israeli ambassador to the UN, Gilad Erdan, to walk out, accusing the UN of rolling out the red carpet for “the butcher of Tehran”.
One person at the United Nations stood up to boldly protest the Butcher of Tehran, lifting up high a sign reading “Iranian women deserve freedom now.” Bravo to Israeli Ambassador Gilad Erdan for courageously showing the rest of the world what they could and should have done.… https://t.co/bd5E0Ed5YL
— Afshine Emrani MD FACC (@afshineemrani) September 20, 2023
This a disgrace how they handle the Israeli Ambassador to the United Nations https://t.co/c8ZqVIPwTM
— neveragainlivepodcast@gmail.com (@neveragainlive1) September 20, 2023
Meanwhile, the US imposed new sanctions on individuals and entities from Iran, China, Russia and Turkey, after Russian troops launched a new massive drone attack on Ukrainian cities.
The fresh restrictions from the US treasury department targeted seven individuals and four entities linked with Iran’s unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) and military aircraft development.
According to the Ukrainian air force, Russian troops launched 30 Shahed-136/131 drones and one Iskander-M missile toward Ukrainian cities on the night of 19 September. Three drones hit industrial warehouses in Lviv, killing one person.
On the sidelines of the UN general assembly, Iran’s political director Bagheri Khani met with political directors of France, Germany and the UK, the so-called E3, who are demanding Tehran drop its plans to throw out a third of the most experienced UN weapons inspectors from.
A move that will severely damage the UN’s ability to inspect and monitor Iran’s civilian nuclear program effectively.
The Iranian side said the meeting had discussed sanctions lifting and the hopes that the recent prisoner exchange between the US and Iran completed on Monday could usher in better diplomatic relations, something that seems increasingly unlikely.
In a joint statement the E3 with the US warned that “Iran continues to expand its nuclear activities. It is now also deliberately hampering the normal planning and conduct of Agency verification and monitoring activities in Iran required under Iran’s Nuclear Proliferation Safeguards Agreement. This is at a time when the International Atomic Energy Agency has serious, longstanding, and unresolved questions related to undeclared nuclear materials and activities in Iran that Iran has failed to address for more than four years”.
Controversial plans for Raisi to speak at the prestigious thinktank the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) on Tuesday were postponed for a day after a request from the Iranian delegation possibly concerned at protests by Iranian diaspora groups.
The CFR event only became public over the weekend, when senior fellow and Iranian dissident Roya Hakakian declined the invitation via a message on X, formerly known as Twitter. Nazanian Boniadi, the human rights activist, accused the CFR of giving a platform to a human rights abuser.
