International, Politics

Trump Administration Should Not Block The Iranian Foreign Minister From Speaking To The United Nations

The Trump administration is reportedly barring Iran’s top diplomat from entering the United States this week to address the United Nations Security Council. If true, that would be an entirely unjustified and unwise move. We host the United Nations and, as long as we intend to do so, we have an obligation to allow travel to the United Nations, particularly by the leading diplomat for a foreign country. We can restrict his movements in the United States, but this should have been approved immediately in line with our agreements.

Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif requested a visa a “few weeks ago” to enter the United States to attend a Jan. 9 Security Council meeting. Zarif has a more pressing interest now in speaking to the United Nations after the Jan. 3 drone strike that killed Maj. Gen. Qassem Suleimani.

We can always debate the long-standing question of our hosting of this body. I think it is a point of pride for our country. However, so long as we are the host, we cannot use that status to regulate who speaks to other countries. The United Nations was founded to allow dialogue and exchange, including between countries which might not otherwise speak directly.

139 thoughts on “Trump Administration Should Not Block The Iranian Foreign Minister From Speaking To The United Nations”

  1. Trump’s Threat To Target Cultural Sites..

    Draws Comparisons To ISIS and The Taliban

    In the days following Trump’s tweets, outrage mounted over the suggestion that the United States would attack cultural sites. Critics compared Trump’s comments to behavior by militant groups such as the Taliban, which notoriously destroyed two massive 6th-century Buddha statues in Afghanistan’s Bamian province, leaving gaping holes in the side of the cliff where they once stood, or the Islamic State, which destroyed parts of the ancient Syrian city of Palmyra, including an amphitheater where the group carried out public executions.

    Edited from: “Iranians Celebrate Their Favorite Cultural Sites After Trump Threatened To Target Them”

    Today’s Washington Post”
    …………………………………………………………………

    The fact that Trump is putting U.S. foreign policy on the level of Islamic terrorists is unsettling, to say the least. There was a time when the U.S. aspired to be ‘a good guy’ on the world’s stage. But now Trump is issuing statements that make our allies cringe while White House staffers try unsuccessfully to walk-back his threats.

    1. Nikki Haley: ‘The only ones mourning Soleimani are Democrat leadership’….

      …and George Soros paid trolls

    2. Mr. Shill,

      In a series of tweets Saturday evening, President Trump wrote that “if Iran strikes any Americans, or American assets,” the U.S. has targeted 52 Iranian sites — “some at a very high level & important to Iran & the Iranian culture, and those targets, and Iran itself, WILL BE HIT VERY FAST AND VERY HARD.”

      – NPR
      _____

      Would that President Trump fought fire with fire.

      People who “cringe” at your words cannot be considered allies.

      Meanwhile, Iran continues to export state-sponsored terrorism and kill savagely.

      The quote of President Trump mentions targeting not bombing and sites “…important to Iran & the Iranian culture..”

      That could include sites like McDonald’s or Kentucky Fried Chicken.

      The threat is an inference not an implication.

  2. I continue to be amazed that we’ve still got troops in so-called “Iraq” along with Trump’s recent comments about this area. Trump just looks like more of the same. The problems in so-called “Iraq” are not caused by “the terrorists.” They are caused by conflicts that will have to be fought to a conclusion.

    The Sunnis and Kurds boycotted the vote to require us to leave this area. The big takeaway from that, regardless of what any of these groups want, is the obvious reality of the current so-called “Iraqi” government. In reality is doesn’t exist and it never did from the start. Bad things happen when you continue to use our military to prop up a fiction.

    The problems in Iraq are not caused by “The Terrorists.” Rather, the conflicts in this area will have to be fought to a conclusion if you’re going to wind up with a functioning government or governments. That conclusion may well involve a strong man who operates not unlike Saddam Hussein. In any case, while these conflicts are being resolved, there will probably be an influx of foreign fighters — most likely because the Sunnis there will choose to tacitly tolerate them as they have done in the past to protect themselves from the Shiites.

    Claiming we have to go back in to get the foreign fighters out will prevent those conflicts from being fought to a conclusion.

        1. Said by another one of the kids on the blog.

          Roberta, and Anonymous at 3:32 PM need to grow up.

  3. I agree that the Iranian diplomat should be allowed to enter to address the UN, while restricting his movements here.

    I’ve pretty over the UN. Once they put human rights abusers on the council of human rights, they lost all credibility. The idea was great. Failed in execution. I’m also tired to propping it up financially.

    It’s a useful venue for the representatives of foreign nations to meet. It’s not a panacea or truthful. It’s been plagued with scandals with UN peacekeepers being found guilty of systematic rape, and UN schools teaching anti-Israel propaganda.

  4. Jon, did you forget that Trump said that Article II of the Constitution gives him literally the right to do whatever he wants? Are you saying this isn’t the case? What’s he afraid that this diplomat is going to say, anyway? This is sort of like the Mueller and House impeachment investigations: he tries to prevent people from talking if what they have to say makes him look bad.

    Every single day he proves that the American voters in 2016 were correct: most of us voted for the other candidate. Since he started smelling up the White House, most Americans, according to polls, do not support him and want him gone. Now, if possible.

    1. You really hate America, don’t you?

      Thanks for admitting you side with America’s enemies. We will not forget. Ever.

      Of all the awful stupid mistakes made by you libs in the last three years, exposing your yellow underbelly is one of the biggest.

      You will lose BIGLY in 2020. Count on it. After you stop crying, assuming you ever do, you will surely be made welcome in any of our enemies’ countries. I suggest Iran or NK. Enjoy.

      1. SW Ohio.

        Don’t assume victory. Instead, work for it. Sign up voters for Trump. And get them to the polls at the right time. Turn them out in phalanxes. That is the work at hand.

        1. All of your points are well taken and I never assume anything. We will be fighting a bigger fight than we did in 2016 and will have to work twice as hard for President Trump.

      2. America is better than Trump, someone who lied to get out of military service when it was his turn to serve. Death count to date due to his stupidity and knee-jerk order to kill the Iranian general: 50 died in the crush of humanity at his funeral. There will be more. Some of them may well be Americans. There was no greater threat from Iran when he gave the kill order than there had ever been in the past: in other words, no imminent threat. Bush and Obama both weighed the pros and cons of killing him versus the fallout and retaliation and both decided that America’s interests were better served by other means. Just like cancelling the nuclear arms agreement–imperfect, but better than the nothing we have now. America is far less safe, and it is Trump’s fault.

      3. No, I LOVE America. America is better than Trump, who is the most unfit and least qualified person ever to occupy the White House. He cheated to get there, and is trying to cheat again to stay there.

        We don’t know how 2020 will turn out, because Republicans will keep cheating: 1. gerrymandering districts to favor them and disfavor Democrats and independents, thus diluting their votes; 2. voter suppression–preventing and placing obstacles in the way of minorities and others they think could be Democratically-inclined from registering; 3. making it hard to vote, by limiting early voting and locating the polls away from public transportation; 4. purging voters from the rolls, but only those they think are or could be Democrats; 5, poll watchers: to intimidate those they think might be Democratically-inclined. This was an old trick used in the Jim Crow days which Republicans are resurrecting now. They even filed a lawsuit to force their way into the polls for this purpose. 6. Moscow Mitch McConnell refusing to allow the election security bill to get passed or even go to committee, which would help ensure that elections are fair. At minimum, it would require back up paper ballots for those states that only vote using computers. Republicans don’t want to play fair. They don’t want anyone who isn’t Republican to have a voice in government, in selection of federal or Supreme Court judges, or in what laws get passed.

        BTW: WE didn’t lose in 2016–Hillary won the popular vote. Congress was given a mandate in 2018. The Senate would have gone Democratic, too, but for Republican gerrymandering. They’re going to keep cheating because that’s the only way they can retain power.

        1. Trump got over 300 Electoral College votes, well above the 270 required to be elected.
          Hillary fell about 40? votes short of the required 270.
          Trump is in the White House, Hillary and Bill are not.
          If Natacha’s choice for November
          “wins” the same way that Hillary “won”, we’ll have 4 more years….
          ….of Natacha claiming that the guy in the White House didn’t win.

          1. He CHEATED. Read the Mueller Report. He was NOT the choice of the voters. His campaign fed information to Russian hackers who used it to strategize the most-effective way to “win” the Electoral College and get around the polls that showed him losing to Hillary Clinton. Russians employed a smear campaign, lying about Hillary Clinton on social media. It worked, which is why Moscow Mitch McConnell won’t try to get the elections security bill even assigned to a committee.

            Then, there’s the gerrymandering, the voter suppression, poll watchers and other dirty tricks Republicans are planning to get their way.

            Trump is not and never will be legitimate.

            1. Behold the hateful liar Natacha, spreading anti-American poison.indicting our elections, because her candidate Hillary did not win!

  5. At the point where America surrenders to the dominion of the United Nations, the Constitution and U.S. sovereignty are nullified.

    That sounds awfully like treason.
    __________________________

    Matthew 6:24

    No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.

  6. “We are five days away from fundamentally transforming the United States of America.”

    – Barack Obama
    _____________

    “If you don’t stand for something, you’ll fall for anything.”

    – Gordon Eadie
    _____________

    “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”

    – Bert Lance
    __________

    “The difference between the Haves and Have-nots? The will to sacrifice and to do what others won’t…. Very simple.”

    – Ziad K. Abdelnour
    _______________

    “Political power grows out of the barrel of the gun…”

    – Mao Tse-tung
    ____________

    “History is written by the victors.”

    – Winston Churchill

  7. Yup- he shouldn’t block the Muslim scumbag form speaking at the UN, all the dune coon will do is bad mouth the US and Isreal. He should outright kick the anti American UN the hell out of the country.

    1. yo mama does not understand how the US has used the UN to accomplish its diplomatic ends, evidently

      when you pry the lid off all the double-talk and read between the lines, a lot of things that don’t make sense when you first hear them, eventually do

    1. ‘Diplomats’ do not hurl threats against a country, or put an $80 million bounty on the head of the country they are attempting to enter.

      The fact that you actually believe this person is a diplomat shows us everything we need to know about YOU and your anti-American feelings.

  9. Pingback: U.S. Denies Iran’s FM Zarif A Visa To Attend U.N. | Verity Weekly

    1. The “imminent threat” posed by Soleimani appears to be threat of peace between Sunnis and Shia:

      “Iraq’s prime minister revealed that he was due to be meeting the Iranian commander to discuss moves being made to ease the confrontation between Shia Iran and Sunni Saudi Arabia – the crux of so much of strife in the Middle East and beyond.

      Adil Abdul-Mahdi was quite clear: “I was supposed to meet him in the morning the day he was killed, he came to deliver a message from Iran in response to the message we had delivered from the Saudis to Iran.” ”

      https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/qassem-soleimani-death-iran-baghdad-middle-east-iraq-saudi-arabia-a9272901.html

      1. bull. if he wanted to talk to Saudis he could make the Hajj and speak to them in person on their own turf, anytime, and be confident of making it out in peace.

        I’m generally a peacenik when it comes to more Middle eastern conflict but I don’t see this assassination as violating any diplomatic customs. The subject was a high ranking soldier and certainly a combatant not a political leader.

        The most troubling aspects, and not very troubling to be honest just a little, but a) it was in Iraq which is nominally an ally and certainly they did not green light it, and b) this talk of targeting cultural sites was foolish, EVEN THOUGH the Iranians have invited the trouble by locating their centrifuge operations near Qom. Still did not sound good.

        Overall, foreign adversaries who target Americans should expect to get killed. This helps keep us all safer in the long run, no matter what the details of this that.

        Old Sulemani got the martyrdom he said he wanted, ok, but let the living take note.

        1. if he wanted to talk to Saudis he could make the Hajj and speak to them in person

          He had gone and talked to the Saudis he was scheduled to meet with the representative of Iran but he was killed.
          This was about peace between SA and Iran. Iraq is caught in the middle of that quarrel.

      2. I’m pretty skeptical, to put it mildly, that Soleimani had the competence or the kind of Constitutional thinking needed to do anything substantive about that dispute. His actions indicate the contrary.

        1. Well it seems believable that Iraq’s prime minister had invited him to discuss a SA & Iran agreement and that meeting never took place because Soleimani was murdered. Maybe Iraq’s prime minister is just trying to convince Iran he and his country were not a party to this murder.

  11. Let’s revisit some tweets by Trump about Obama. They’re not what certain partisans who either cheer or oppose Trump regardless of substance might expect. Unfortunately, I have gotten all to used to them. This guy appears to be someone who enjoys a sound bite that will garner some press, not someone who is following through on actual policy.

    https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/141604554855825408?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E141604554855825408&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cnn.com%2Fmiddleeast%2Flive-news%2Fbaghdad-airport-strike-live-intl-hnk%2Findex.html

    https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/260421157201784832?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E260421157201784832&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cnn.com%2Fmiddleeast%2Flive-news%2Fbaghdad-airport-strike-live-intl-hnk%2Findex.html

    twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/379717298296086529?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E379717298296086529&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cnn.com%2Fmiddleeast%2Flive-news%2Fbaghdad-airport-strike-live-intl-hnk%2Findex.html

  12. short reply and that’s all that is needed. Reportedly is like purportedly and alleged they all mean unproven. So when you get some real information post this again and it will have some meaning.

  13. Pingback: U.S. Denies Iran's FM Zarif A Visa To Attend U.N. - Excalibur News

  14. I have been reading a lot of posts on this subject. I can’t believe some Americans are not supporting this. I will tell you this, they won’t think twice about cutting your head off and sh**ting down your neck

      1. Beheading is a STANDARD method of killing for every muslim on earth and is written in their terrorist manual the quran

          1. Sunnis do consider the Shiites heretics. I am not a Muslim so that’s their business. If you ask me the problems with the Iranians don’t arise from their religion however, they’re fundamentally geopolitical.

            I suspect that if you stack the Iranian mullahs up against the Saudi clerics, the Saudis probably sound crazier than the Persians, however, our geopolitical interests align with the Saudis, so we look past their extreme renderings of Islam.

            Life can be a messy and complicated business

            1. I question how substantive our geopolitical interests are with Saudi Arabia in contrast to Iran. Trust no one in the Middle East, including Israel, and work the various countries there when it suits us. Unfortunately, the Saudi’s flood Washington and capital hill with money. So does AIPAC. So it suits our leaders to spew a continuous litany of skewed talking points about those two countries that our wonderful Washington press corps regurgitates without doing much independent research on their own.

              1. i agree that the US should pursue its own interests including vis a vis Israel. I agree that AIPAC has a lot of influence and sometimes US politicians are remiss in being to charitable towards Israelis on this or that. Ironically, American jews on the left have become the most ardent critics of Israel of late, though I’m not exactly sure why, because they seem to complain about things which would advance American interests even less than what they presume to criticize.

                For example. I am not Jewish. I am not per se enamored of having a Jewish state in Palestine as a general proposition. But if you think a Muslim state in Palestine, occupying the land now called Israel, would be better for America, well, I think probably. Almost certainly not.

                In this instance, with Sulemani, i think the US knocked off a capable adversary, who has targeted Americans and killed them with his supervised operations, and hence, he was basically an armed combatant and no politician or diplomat. I don’t have a problem with the US targeting him. The result of knocking off one of their generals is compelling lesson for them which indeed may actually deter war rather than provoke it.

                And yet, I do think it makes a certain mess more difficult in Iraq however, so I hope time shows that it was worth it.

  15. I’m surprised you’re not siding with Trump as he is only doing what he normally does. Why don’t you people see this?

  16. Trump and his enablers are angling for, and gambling on, war, in the short term to squelch impeachment, in the long term to prepare the ground for cancelling the 2020 presidential election. But the Democrats will not impeach him for this, because they’re complicit in the overall agenda to dominate the Middle East and subvert the civil liberties of the American public. The only resistance to this degradation of democratic government which will be effective will come from outside both political parties and their hangers on, if it comes from anywhere at all.

    1. in the long term to prepare the ground for cancelling the 2020 presidential election

      You have to chuckle at this given the habit among partisan Democrats for calling other people ‘morons’ and such.

  18. Wouldn’t teleconferencing at the UN be a safer way to make Iran’s position known?

  20. We are in a state of war with Iran, We could allow him in and then seize him as an enemy combatant.

    1. You are another stupid Murican, aren’t u Paul? Do u get a headache trying to remember to breathe?

      1. And Paul’s comment has been “liked by 3 people.”

        Plenty of dim Americans.

    2. Paul, the U.N. is a prestigious component of New York City’s economy. It’s what makes NYC one of the world’s most important cities.

      1. NYC was one of the world’s most important cities long before the UN existed. It’s the capitol of capital. Which is why the UN is there and not vice versa.

        The UN has been an effective means for the US to pursue its diplomatic interests is the main thing to understand about the UN. On balance.

        1. Kurtz, there was a long period through the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s when New York was in decline with a depressed economy. During those years the U.N. was one of the few draws keeping New York relevant.

          1. During those years the U.N. was one of the few draws keeping New York relevant.

            Business and industry brought $127 bn of personal income to the New York – New Jersey commuter belt in 1975 (i.e. $470 bn in today’s currency units). That set of counties accounted for 7.8% of the country’s population and 9.2% of it’s personal income flow. It contained two of the four consequential bourses in the country, mega medical facilities, seven research universities, and an enormous slice of the financial sector and the publishing sector. It didn’t require tourists shlepping about the UN building to be ‘relevant’.

          2. Peter, during the dry spell Trump was building in NYC when few would and in 1986 Trump fixed the Wollman Rink with his own money that was only returned after the rink sold tickets and only up to the amount spent. This was after many years and loads of money where the City couldn’t do the job. You and I can get together and send Giuliani a cheer for a job well done.

            1. Peter, in my comment above I failed to separate Trump and Giuliani. I meant to say that Giuliani was a great mayor and did a lot to clean up NYC and make it liveable again. He did a fantastic job.

              You and I can get together and send Giuliani a cheer for a job well done.

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