UN Security Council meets on Iran

Reuters :

The UN Security Council met on Sunday to discuss US strikes on Iran’s nuclear sites as Russia, China and Pakistan proposed the 15-member body adopt a resolution calling for an immediate and unconditional ceasefire in the Middle East.
“The bombing of Iranian nuclear facilities by the United States marks a perilous turn,” UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told the Security Council on Sunday. “We must act – immediately and decisively – to halt the fighting and return to serious, sustained negotiations on the Iran nuclear programme.”
The world awaited Iran’s response on Sunday after President Donald Trump said the US had “obliterated” Tehran’s key nuclear sites, joining Israel in the biggest Western military action against the Islamic Republic since its 1979 revolution.
Russia and China condemned the US strikes.
“Peace in the Middle East cannot be achieved by the use of force,” said China’s UN Ambassador Fu Cong. “Diplomatic means to address the Iranian nuclear issue haven’t been exhausted, and there’s still hope for a peaceful solution.”
But acting US Ambassador to the UN Dorothy Shea told the council the time had come for Washington to act decisively, urging the Security Council to call upon Iran to end its effort to eradicate Israel and terminate its drive for nuclear weapons.
“Iran long obfuscated its nuclear weapons program and stonewalled our good-faith efforts in recent negotiations,” she said. “The Iranian regime cannot have a nuclear weapon.”
Russia’s UN Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia recalled former US Secretary of State Colin Powell making the case at the UN Security Council in 2003 that Iraqi President Saddam Hussein constituted an imminent danger to the world because of the country’s stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons.
“Again we’re being asked to believe the US’s fairy tales, to once again inflict suffering on millions of people living in the Middle East. This cements our conviction that history has taught our US colleagues nothing,” he said.
Iran requested the UN Security Council meeting on Sunday.
Iran’s UN Ambassador Amir Saeid Iravani accused Israel and the US of destroying diplomacy, said all US allegations are unfounded and that the nuclear non-proliferation treaty “has been manipulated into a political weapon.”
“Instead of guaranteeing parties’ legitimate rights to peaceful nuclear energy, it has been exploited as a pretext for aggression and unlawful action that jeopardize the supreme interests of my country,” Iravani told the council.
Israel’s UN Ambassador Danny Danon praised the US for taking action against Iran, saying: “This is what the last line of defense looks like when every other line has failed.” He accused Iran of using negotiations over its nuclear programme as camouflage to buy time to build missiles and enrich uranium.