Zarif Calls UN Security Council Meeting on Iran 'Shameless'

Mohammad Javad Zarif, Iran's Foreign Minister, described the allocation of a UN Security Council meeting to Iran on the sidelines of this year's General Assembly as 'shameless.' This meeting is set to take place on September 26, chaired by Donald Trump, the President of the United States. On Wednesday, September 4, Zarif tweeted that Trump intends to divert attention from the issue of Palestine by exploiting his temporary presidency of the Security Council. Nikki Haley, the U.S. ambassador to the UN, mentioned on Tuesday that Trump will preside over a Security Council meeting regarding Iran during the UN General Assembly at the end of September. According to her, this meeting will include world leaders and aims to discuss how to exert more pressure on Iran for violating UN resolutions. However, Zarif tweeted that 'the UN Security Council has only one resolution regarding Iran, which Trump has violated and is trying to coerce others into doing the same.' Zarif's reference is to the nuclear agreement between Iran and six world powers in July 2015, which the UN Security Council endorsed. Trump, who has always opposed this agreement and described it as weak, withdrew Washington from it on May 8 of this year to resume sanctions against Tehran. In his tweet, Zarif further stated that 'he intends to misuse the presidency of the UN Security Council to divert the topic of a meeting that has been dedicated to Palestine for seventy years, in order to blame Iran for the terrible conditions created by the United States and its clients across the Middle East. Shameless!' Diplomats have stated that Iran could also request to speak at the Security Council meeting on September 26. Hassan Rouhani, the President of Iran, is scheduled to travel to New York for the General Assembly meeting in the first week of October. Ahmad Jannati, the head of the Assembly of Experts, mentioned that Trump 'maliciously' wants to meet with Rouhani on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly. However, Rouhani's chief of staff dismissed these remarks as baseless. In recent weeks, Ali Khamenei, the leader of the Islamic Republic, has explicitly stated that he will not allow negotiations with the U.S. at this time.