Iran and US swap threats at UNSC meeting while Israel urges ‘all possible sanctions’ over attack

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Iran’s UN Ambassador Amir Saeid Iravani, top left, listens as Israel’s Ambassador Gilad Erdan addresses the United Nations Security Council during an emergency meeting at UN headquarters on April 14, 2024. (AP)
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Updated 15 April 2024
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Iran and US swap threats at UNSC meeting while Israel urges ‘all possible sanctions’ over attack

  • Iran envoy: If US attacks Iran, Tehran will use ‘its inherent right to respond proportionately’
  • US ambassador: If Iran attacks US, it will be held responsible

NEW YORK: Iran on Sunday said it has no intention of engaging militarily with the US in the region but will “use its inherent right to respond proportionately” if the latter initiates a military operation against it, its citizens, or security interests.

Amir Saeid Iravani, Iran’s permanent representative to the UN, told a meeting of the organization’s Security Council on Sunday that his country’s attack on Israel was “precise, only targeted military objectives and was carried out carefully to minimize the potential for escalation and prevents civilian harm.”

On Saturday, Iran launched dozens of drones and missiles in retaliation against an Israeli strike on its consulate in Damascus which killed seven revolutionary guards, including two generals. Iran had warned Israel would be “punished” for the strike, which took place on April 1.

Sunday’s emergency meeting was requested by Israel’s permanent representative to the UN, Gilad Erdan, who called council members to “unequivocally condemn Iran (and) immediately act to designate the IRGC as a terrorist organization.”

Iran said that Saturday’s attack was in line with Article 51 of the UN Charter, which invokes the “inherent right of individual or collective self-defense if an armed attack occurs against a Member of the United Nations, until the Security Council has taken measures necessary to maintain international peace and security.”

US ambassador Robert Wood warned that “if Iran or its proxies take actions against the United States or further action against Israel, Iran will be held responsible.”

Wood condemned “the unprecedented attack on Israel by Iran and its militant proxies and partners” in the strongest terms. Iran’s “reckless actions” not only posed a threat to populations in Israel, he said, but also to other UN member states in the region, including Jordan and Iraq.

The diplomat added: “Security Council has an obligation to not let Iran’s actions go unanswered. For far too long, Iran has flagrantly violated its international legal obligations through the actions of its IRGC, by arming Hezbollah, by arming, facilitating and enabling Houthi attacks on Saudi Arabia and the UAE and, more recently, merchant and commercial shipping in the Red Sea.”

Wood also accused Iran of being complicit in the October 7 attack on Israel, having provided “significant funding and training for Hamas.”

He said the US would explore “additional measures to hold Iran accountable at the UN,” and called on the Security Council to unequivocally condemn Iran’s actions and call for it “and its partners and proxies to cease their attacks.”

Israel’s Gilad Erdan compared Iran Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei to Hitler. He said that in its “plot to impose a global Shiite hegemony through its proxies, Iran has even attacked Saudi Arabia, the Aramco oil field in the UAE and anyone else they view as an obstacle.”

He told the UNSC: “The only option is to condemn Iran and utilize every means necessary to make them pay a heavy price for their horrible crimes,” and warned that Tehran was “barreling towards nuclear capabilities, has enriched uranium up to 60 percent purity, and its breakout time to produce nuclear weapons is now mere weeks away.”

“Impose sanctions on Iran before it is too late,” said Erdan, adding: “We are being fired upon from all fronts, from every border. We are surrounded by Iran’s terror proxies. The war in Gaza extends far broader than Israel and Hamas. All of the terror groups attacking Israel are tentacles of the same Shia octopus, the Iranian octopus.”




Israel’s UN Ambassador Gilad Erdan shows a video of the Iran missile attack during a meeting of the Security Council on Middle East security on April 14, 2024. (REUTERS)

He warned that “while the Ayatollah regime thinks Israel is a frog in boiling water, they are wrong. This attack crossed every red line and Israel reserves the legal right to retaliate. We are a nation of lions. Following such a massive and direct attack on Israel, the entire world — let alone Israel — cannot settle for inaction.”

Russia’s permanent representative to the UN Vasily Nebenzia accused the council of hypocrisy and double standards over its failure to convene in a similar fashion following Israel’s attack on the Iranian consulate in Damascus, or what he called the “now regular attacks by Israel against Syria and Lebanon.”

The Russian envoy warned: “If the council’s inaction on such matters will continue, then your appeals to restraint by all parties can become futile.”




Russia’s UN Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia accused the Security Council of hypocrisy and double standard for not convening in a similar fashion following Israel’s attack on the Iranian consulate in Damascus. (Getty Images/AFP)

China’s deputy permanent representative Dai Bing noted Iran’s statement that its military action was in response to Israel’s aggression and “the matter can be deemed concluded.”

Dai added: “If the flames of the Gaza conflict are allowed to continue raging, then the adverse spillover is set to spread still further, making the region even more unstable. Countries and peoples in the Middle East have no desire for, nor can they afford, a larger conflict or war.”

Nacim Gaouaoui, Algeria’s deputy permanent representative, said recent developments could not overrule the central question “which is the aggression on the Palestinian people in Gaza, and at the same time, it can never be used as a pretext or cover to launch a land attack against Rafah. Algeria calls again for ceasefire, and an end to Israel’s heinous killing machine.”

Slovenia condemned Saturday’s events in the same way it condemned the attack on the Iranian consulate.

Slovenia’s permanent representative to the UN Samuel Zbogar urged all parties to “choose the path of dialog and diplomacy and refrain from further retaliations.”

He said: “The sequence of these events accelerates the spiral of violence, escalating into a broader conflict of unpredictable scope. Slovenia continues to believe that a ceasefire in Gaza would have a calming effect on tensions in the region. Every moment we delay, the risk of a broader conflict increases in these chaotic times.”

Malta’s UN ambassador, Vanessa Frazier, said the Middle East was experiencing “one of the bleakest and most volatile periods in modern history, which risks spiraling out of control if all sides do not take a step back.

“Focus should be on defusing tensions by advocating for an immediate and permanent ceasefire to the war in Gaza, facilitating immediate and unconditional release of all hostages and ensuring the delivery of sustained humanitarian aid throughout Gaza. All we are witnessing are steps in the opposite direction,” she told the meeting.

Meanwhile, Sierra Leone’s UN ambassador, Michael Imran Kanu, warned that “the escalating tension in the Middle East is dangerous and unprecedented, with the potential to destabilize not only the entire region, but impact global peace and security.”

The UK’s permanent representative to the UN, Barbara Woodward, condemned Iran’s attack on Israel and accused Tehran of being intent on sowing chaos in the region.




Britain’s UN Ambassador Barbara Woodward, addressing the Security Council meeting, accused Iran of being intent on sowing chaos in the Middle East region. (AP)

“As we have demonstrated, the United Kingdom will continue to stand up for Israel’s security, and that of all our regional partners, including Jordan and Iraq.”

Nathalie Broadhurst, France’s deputy permanent representative, said Iran crossed a new threshold in its destabilizing action and was risking a military escalation for which “it would be responsible.”


UN warns of ‘chaotic’ Afghan refugee-return crisis and calls for urgent international action

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UN warns of ‘chaotic’ Afghan refugee-return crisis and calls for urgent international action

  • More than 40,000 people arriving from Iran each day, reaching a high of 50,000 on July 4, as more than 1.6m refugees return from there and Pakistan so far this year
  • ‘Handled with calm, foresight and compassion, returns can be a force for stability. Handled haphazardly, they will lead to instability, unrest and onward movements,’ agency says

NEW YORK CITY: With more than 1.6 million Afghans returning to their home country from Iran and Pakistan so far this year, the UN Refugee Agency warned on Thursday that the scale and intensity of the mass returns are creating a humanitarian emergency in a country already gripped by poverty, drought and insecurity.

Arafat Jamal, UNHCR’s representative in Afghanistan, on Friday described the situation as “evolving and chaotic,” as he urged countries in the region and the wider international community to urgently commit resources, show restraint and coordinate their efforts to avoid further destabilization of Afghanistan and the region.

“We are calling for restraint, for resources, for dialogue and international cooperation,” he said.

“Handled with calm, foresight and compassion, returns can be a force for stability. Handled haphazardly, they will lead to instability, unrest and onward movements.”

According to UNHCR figures, more than 1.3 million people have returned from Iran alone since the start of this year, many of them under coercive or involuntary circumstances.

In recent days, arrivals at the Islam Qala crossing on the border with Iran have peaked at more than 40,000 people a day, with a high of 50,000 recorded on July 4.

Jamal warned that many of the returnees, often born abroad and unfamiliar with Afghanistan, arrive “tired, disoriented, brutalized and often in despair.” He raised particular concern about the fate of women and girls who arrive in a country where their fundamental rights are severely restricted.

Iran has signaled its intention to expel as many as 4 million Afghans, a move UNHCR predicts could double the number of returnees by the end of the year. Jamal said the agency is now preparing for up to 3 million arrivals this year. Afghanistan remains ill-equipped to absorb such large numbers.

“This is precarity layered upon poverty, on drought, on human-rights abuses, and on an unstable region,” Jamal said, citing a UN Development Programme report that found 70 percent of

Afghans live at subsistence levels, and a recent drought alert from the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization.

UNHCR’s humanitarian response is severely underfunded, with just 28 percent of its operations financed so far this year. Jamal described agonizing decisions being made in the field, including reductions of food rations and other aid supplies: “Should we give one blanket instead of four to a family? One meal instead of three?”

Despite the strained resources, Jamal said the agency is still providing emergency food and water, shelter and transportation at reception centers, and working with partners such as UNICEF to address the needs of unaccompanied children, about 400 of whom were reportedly deported from Iran in just over two weeks.

Pressed on how the UN can support peace and development in a country where women face widespread discrimination, and access to education and healthcare is limited, Jamal acknowledged the severe challenges but defended the organization’s continued engagement.

“Yes, this is the worst country in the world for women’s rights,” he said. “Yet with adequate funding, the UN is able to reach women. We’ve built women-only markets, trained midwives, and supported women entrepreneurs.

“We must invest in the people of Afghanistan, even in these grim circumstances.”

He added that the Taliban, despite their own restrictions and resource constraints, have so far welcomed the returnees and facilitated UN operations at the border.

UNHCR is now appealing for a coordinated regional strategy and renewed donor support. Jamal highlighted positive examples of regional cooperation, such as trade initiatives by Uzbekistan, as potential models for this.

He also welcomed a recent UN General Assembly resolution calling for the voluntary, safe and dignified return of refugees, and increased international collaboration on the issue.

“Billions have been wasted on war,” he said. “Now is the time to invest in peace.”


Philippine president to meet Trump in Washington this month

Updated 11 July 2025
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Philippine president to meet Trump in Washington this month

  • Security, tariff issues will be priorities when Marcos meets Trump, expert says
  • Manila, Washington have increasingly boosted defense engagements in recent years

MANILA: President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. will visit Washington this month, the Philippine Foreign Ministry said on Friday, making this the first trip of a Southeast Asian leader since Donald Trump took office.

The trip, which follows Trump’s tariffs announcement earlier this week, will take place from July 20 to 22, the Philippine Department of Foreign Affairs said in a statement, adding that details of the visit are not yet finalized.

Philippine Ambassador to the US Jose Manuel Romualdez told reporters that Marcos is the “first ASEAN head of state invited by Trump,” referring to the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.

Trade and security will likely be the focus of discussions, according to Prof. Ranjit Sing Rye, president of OCTA Research.

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“I think it’s a very significant meeting of both leaders of the Philippines and the US, especially at this time when there’s so much dynamics in the … South China Sea,” Rye told Arab News.

“It signifies and symbolizes the broadening and deepening of US-Philippine relations under the Trump administration.”

Tensions have continued to run high between the Philippines and China over territorial disputes in the South China Sea, a strategic waterway through which billions of dollars of goods pass each year.

Manila and Beijing have been involved in frequent maritime confrontations in recent years, with China maintaining its expansive claims of the area, despite a 2016 international tribunal ruling the historical assertion to it had no basis.

The US has a seven-decade-old mutual defense treaty with the Philippines and Washington has repeatedly warned that a Chinese attack on Filipino ships could trigger a US military response.

Philippine and US forces have increasingly upped mutual defense engagements, including large-scale combat exercises in the Philippines.

Manila is also sending trade officials to the US next week to hold further negotiations on tariffs, after Trump raised a planned tariff on Philippine exports to the US to 20 percent from 17 percent.

It is not immediately clear if the Marcos visit will coincide with that of Manila’s tariff-negotiating team.

“Over the next three years, there will be, in my view, a broadening and deepening of US-Philippine relations on many levels, not just economic, not just socioeconomic, but also in trade, but also in security relations,” Rye said.

“And maybe some of these details will be threshed out during that meeting.”

This will be Marcos’ third visit to the US since he became president in 2022.

His last trip was in April 2024, when he met with then President Joe Biden and former Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida in the first trilateral summit among the treaty allies. 


Thousands gather in Srebrenica to mark 30 years since genocide against Bosniak Muslims

Updated 11 July 2025
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Thousands gather in Srebrenica to mark 30 years since genocide against Bosniak Muslims

  • Thousands gather to mark massacre of more than 8,000 Muslim boys and men in Europe’s only genocide since WWII
  • Seven newly identified victims of the 1995 massacre, including two 19-year-old men, were laid to rest

SREBRENICA, Bosnia-Herzegovina: Thousands of people from Bosnia and around the world gathered in Srebrenica to mark the 30th anniversary of a massacre there of more than 8,000 Bosniak Muslim boys and men — an atrocity that has been acknowledged as Europe’s only genocide after the Holocaust.

Seven newly identified victims of the 1995 massacre, including two 19-year-old men, were laid to rest in a collective funeral at a vast cemetery near Srebrenica Friday, next to more than 6,000 victims already buried there. Such funerals are held annually for the victims who are still being unearthed from dozens of mass graves around the town.

Relatives of the victims, however, often can bury only partial remains of their loved ones as they are typically found in several different mass graves, sometimes kilometers (miles) apart. Such was the case of Mirzeta Karic, who was waiting to bury her father.

“Thirty years of search and we are burying a bone,” she said, crying by her father’s coffin which was wrapped in green cloth in accordance with Islamic tradition.

“I think it would be easier if I could bury all of him. What can I tell you, my father is one of the 50 (killed) from my entire family,” she added.

July 11, 1995, is the day when the killings started after Bosnian Serb fighters overran the eastern Bosnian enclave in the final months of the interethnic war in the Balkan country.

After taking control of the town that was a protected UN safe zone during the war, Bosnian Serb fighters separated Bosniak Muslim men and boys from their families and brutally executed them in just several days. The bodies were then dumped in mass graves around Srebrenica which they later dug up with bulldozers, scattering the remains among other burial sites to hide the evidence of their war crimes.

The UN General Assembly last year adopted a resolution to commemorate the Srebrenica genocide on the July 11 anniversary.

Scores of international officials and dignitaries attended the commemoration ceremonies and the funeral. Among them were European Council President Antonio Costa and Britain’s Duchess of Edinburgh, Sophie, who said that “our duty must be to remember all those lost so tragically and to never let these things happen again.”

Dutch Foreign Minister Caspar Veldkamp said he felt “humbled” because UN troops from the Netherlands were based in Srebrenica when Bosnian Serbs stormed the town.

“I see to what extent commemorating Srebrenica genocide is important,” he said.

In an emotional speech, Munira Subasic, who heads the Mothers of Srebrenica association, urged Europe and the world to “help us fight against hatred, against injustice and against killings.”

Subasic, who lost her husband and youngest son in Srebrenica along with more than 20 relatives, told Europe to “wake up.”

“As I stand here many mothers in Ukraine and Palestine are going through what we went through in 1995,” Subasic said, referring to ongoing conflicts. “It’s the 21st century but instead of justice, fascism has woken up.”

On the eve of the anniversary, an exhibition was inaugurated displaying personal items belonging to the victims that were found in the mass graves over the years.

The conflict in Bosnia erupted in 1992, when Bosnian Serbs took up arms in a rebellion against the country’s independence from the former Yugoslavia and with an aim to create their own state and eventually unite with neighboring Serbia. More than 100,000 people were killed and millions displaced before a US-brokered peace agreement was reached in 1995.

Bosnia remains ethnically split while both Bosnian Serbs and neighboring Serbia refuse to acknowledge that the massacre in Srebrenica was a genocide despite rulings by two UN courts. Bosnian Serb political and military leaders Radovan Karadzic and Ratko Mladic, along with many others, were convicted and sentenced for genocide.

Serbia’s populist President Aleksandar Vucic expressed condolences on X while calling the Srebrenica massacre a “terrible crime.”

“There is no room in Europe — or anywhere else — for genocide denial, revisionism, or the glorification of those responsible,” European Council President Costa said in his speech. “Denying such horrors only poisons our future.”


NATO needs more long-range missiles to deter Russia, US general says

Updated 11 July 2025
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NATO needs more long-range missiles to deter Russia, US general says

  • The war in Ukraine has underscored Europe’s heavy dependence on the United States to provide long-range missiles

BERLIN: NATO will need more long-range missiles in its arsenal to deter Russia from attacking Europe because Moscow is expected to increase production of long-range weapons, a US Army general told Reuters.
Russia’s effective use of long-range missiles in its war in Ukraine has convinced Western military officials of their importance for destroying command posts, transportation hubs and missile launchers far behind enemy lines.
“The Russian army is bigger today than it was when they started the war in Ukraine,” Major General John Rafferty said in an interview at a US military base in Wiesbaden, Germany.
“And we know that they’re going to continue to invest in long-range rockets and missiles and sophisticated air defenses. So more alliance capability is really, really important.”
The war in Ukraine has underscored Europe’s heavy dependence on the United States to provide long-range missiles, with Kyiv seeking to strengthen its air defenses.
Rafferty recently completed an assignment as commander of the US Army’s 56th Artillery Command in the German town of Mainz-Kastel, which is preparing for temporary deployments of long-range US missiles on European soil from 2026.
At a meeting with US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth on Monday, German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius is expected to try to clarify whether such deployments, agreed between Berlin and Washington when Joe Biden was president, will go ahead now that Donald Trump is back in the White House.
The agreement foresaw the deployment of systems including Tomahawk missiles with a range of 1,800 km and the developmental hypersonic weapon Dark Eagle with a range of around 3,000 km.
Russia has criticized the planned deployment of longer-range US missiles in Germany as a serious threat to its national security. It has dismissed NATO concerns that it could attack an alliance member and cited concerns about NATO expansion as one of its reasons for invading Ukraine in 2022.
European plans
Fabian Hoffmann, a doctoral research fellow at Oslo University who specializes in missiles, estimated that the US provides some 90 percent of NATO’s long-range missile capabilities.
“Long-range strike capabilities are crucial in modern warfare,” he said. “You really, really don’t want to be caught in a position like Ukraine (without such weapons) in the first year (of the war). That puts you at an immediate disadvantage.”
Aware of this vulnerability, European countries in NATO have agreed to increase defense spending under pressure from Trump.
Some European countries have their own long-range missiles but their number and range are limited. US missiles can strike targets at a distance of several thousand km.
Europe’s air-launched cruise missiles, such as the British Storm Shadow, the French Scalp and the German Taurus, have a range of several hundred km. France’s sea-launched Missile de Croisiere Naval (MdCN) can travel more than 1,000 km.
They are all built by European arms maker MBDA which has branches in Britain, France, Germany and Italy.
France, Germany, Italy, Poland, Britain and Sweden are now participating in a program to acquire long-range, ground-launched conventional missiles known as the European Long-Range Strike Approach (ELSA).
As part of the program, Britain and Germany announced in mid-May that they would start work on the development of a missile with a range of over 2,000 km.


‘Everybody is tired’ of war in Ukraine, UN migration chief says

Updated 11 July 2025
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‘Everybody is tired’ of war in Ukraine, UN migration chief says

  • Russia’s invasion has triggered Europe’s biggest refugee crisis this century, with 5.6 million Ukrainian refugees globally and 3.8 million uprooted in their country

ROME: Fatigue over the war in Ukraine and US-led foreign aid cuts are jeopardizing efforts to support people fleeing hardship, the head of the UN migration agency warned in an interview on Friday. International Organization for Migration (IOM) Director General Amy Pope was speaking a day after a Ukraine recovery conference in Rome mobilized over €10 billion ($11.69 billion) for the country.

“It’s three-and-a-half years into the conflict. I think it’s fair to say that everybody is tired, and we hear that even from Ukrainians who’ve been experiencing the ongoing attacks in their cities and often have been displaced multiple times,” she said.

“The response to it, though, has to be peace, because ultimately, without peace, there won’t be an end, not only to the funding request, but also to the support for the Ukrainian people.”

Russia’s invasion has triggered Europe’s biggest refugee this century, with 5.6 million Ukrainian refugees globally and 3.8 million uprooted in their country, according to UN data. The IOM and other UN agencies are hampered by major funding shortages as US President Donald Trump slashes foreign aid and European donors like Britain shift funds from development to defense.

US decisions will give the IOM a $1 billion shortfall this year, Pope said, saying budget reductions should be phased gradually or else Trump and others risk stoking even worse migration crises.

“It doesn’t work to have provided assistance and then just walk away and leave nothing. And what we see happening when support falls is that people move again … So (the cuts) can ultimately have a backlash,” she said.

Warning for US, praise for Italy

Pope, 51, is the first woman to lead the IOM and a former adviser to the Obama and Biden administrations who is now working with Trump’s White House on so-called “self-deportations.”

She said the IOM has decades of experience of such programs in Europe and they take time to implement, especially to prepare returnees and check they are going voluntarily.

“That doesn’t always move as quickly as governments would like,” Pope said.

Asked whether the IOM would stop working with the US if the returns turned out to be forced, she said: “We’ve made clear to them what our standards are, and as with every member state, we outline what we can do and what we can’t do, and they understand that, and it is part of the deal.”

After Rome, Pope was on her way to Washington to meet with Trump administration officials and US lawmakers. Turning to Europe, she praised Italy’s decision to increase migrant work permits to nearly 500,000 for 2026-2028, coming from a right-wing government otherwise pursuing tough border policies.

“What Italy is doing is taking a realistic look at what labor they need, what skills they need, what talent they need. And then they’re designing a system to allow people to come in through a safe and legal channel,” Pope said.