UNITED NATIONS -- Iran has formally complained to the United Nations that U.S. President Donald Trump’s explicit threat to annihilate the Islamic Republic constitutes a violation of international law and the UN Charter, warning that such statements cannot be dismissed as political rhetoric.
In a letter to UN Secretary-General António Guterres and the president of the Security Council, Iran’s Ambassador and Chargé d’Affaires to the United Nations Gholamhussein Darzi said Trump made the remarks on September 22 during his address to the 81st session of the UN General Assembly, abusing the very platform established to promote international peace and cooperation.
Darzi said Trump has “openly threatened the Islamic Republic of Iran, a founding member of the United Nations, with destruction” from the UN podium, quoting the U.S. president as saying: “I annihilate the Islamic Republic and do it quickly.”
“These hateful and disgusting statements are neither ambiguous nor unprecedented,” Darzi wrote, describing them as part of a continuing pattern of public threats against Iran by the leader of a permanent member of the UN Security Council.
“The General Assembly is not a place for threats of annihilation,” Darzi stated.
He warned that “international inaction and the normalization of such threats and heinous crimes aimed at destroying a nation, its people and its civilization” will undermine the authority of the UN Charter and the organization’s responsibility to prevent threats to international peace and security.
Darzi further stated that regardless of whether the threats were merely “baseless fantasies,” they will not be carried out