Democracy Dies with Dictatorship
NY Times
Sep 23, 2026
U.N. Live Updates: Iran’s President Accuses U.S. and Israel of Lawless Attacks in a Defiant Address
Masoud Pezeshkian said Iran was open to diplomacy but would never accept limits on its civilian nuclear program. Before his speech later today, President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine called on allies to apply more pressure on Russia.
Updated
Sept. 23, 2026, 12:50 p.m. ET17 minutes ago
Farnaz Fassihi reported from the United Nations.
Here’s the latest
Iran’s president, Masoud Pezeshkian, delivered a defiant speech to the United Nations General Assembly on Wednesday, brandishing pictures of people killed by American and Israeli airstrikes while standing at the same lectern where a day earlier President Trump had threatened toannihilate” Iran.
Mr. Pezeshkian vowed that Iran could “not be made to surrender” and said it would never accept limits on its nuclear program, which he claimed was for peaceful purposes. He accused the United States and Israel of going “against international law” by targeting civilian infrastructure in its strikes on Iran.
“Yes they did hit us,” he said, “but we did not bend the knee.”
It was the first time in the world body’s 81-year history that the president of a country that is actively at war with the United States has set foot in New York to address the Assembly. Just seven months ago, Mr. Pezeshkian was running his country from an underground bunker, trying to stay alive as U.S. and Israeli airstrikes rained down.
Now, Mr. Pezeshkian is being protected by the Secret Service, as per protocol, and he has been cruising through Manhattan in convoys of S.U.V.s as well as holding a marathon of diplomatic meetings.
Mr. Trump focused on Iran in his address to world leaders on Tuesday, saying that he faced a choice: to strike a deal with Iran and help it become economically prosperous, or to “annihilate” it. Mr. Trump’s goals in the war have often shifted, and he now often states that his primary objective is to destroy Iran’s nuclear program.
In his speech, Mr. Pezeshkian stressed that Iran was attacked by the United States and Israel, its top leaders had been assassinated, its schoolchildren killed by American bombs and its population subjected to severe economic hardships. He showed pictures of fresh graves but also left open the door to new peace talks, saying Iran was “ready for dialogue.”
In an unexpected development on Tuesday, American and Iranian representatives met through mediators for the first time since a peace agreement fell apart in July. Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, communicated through Qatari mediators with the U.S. special envoy, Steve Witkoff, and Jared Kushner, a son-in-law of Mr. Trump’s, on the sidelines of the General Assembly.
According to two Iranian officials, they discussed how Tehran and Washington could resume peace talks. Esmail Baghaei, the spokesman for Iran’s foreign ministry, wrote on social media that the Iranians had demanded a halt to the war, the lifting of the naval blockade on ports and the return of seized Iranian assets.
Gen. Yahya Rahim Safavi, the top military adviser to Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei, told Iranian state television on Tuesday that the supreme leader had “right now decided to give the government an open hand to negotiate.”
Here is what else to expect:
Speakers: Among the other leaders scheduled to address the Assembly on Wednesday are Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky, and Delcy Rodríguez, who has led Venezuela’s government since the United States deposed Nicolás Maduro in January.
Walkouts: The lone U.S. diplomat in the General Assembly hall left his seat as Mr. Pezeshkian spoke. Leaving the chamber in protest has a long history in the U.N. In recent years, it has become something of a tradition. Read more ›
Ukraine: At a Security Council meeting, Russia blamed Europe and its prewar support for Ukraine for its full-scale invasion in 2022. He said that European leaders had sought to “whip up an anti-Russia campaign” and that, as a result, Russia “had to” start what it calls its “special military operation” against Ukraine.
A.I.: The U.N. Security Council will convene a session of foreign ministers on the threat posed by artificial intelligence, specifically the use of A.I. weapons in conflicts. The event has gained more urgency after recent warnings by some A.I. developers that without significant oversight, the technology could pose a threat to humanity.
Climate change: A summit hosted by António Guterres, the U.N. secretary-general, will take place in the afternoon, bringing together leaders of governments from countries most vulnerable to climate upheaval, as well as major energy producers and consumers.
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Sept. 23, 2026, 12:33 p.m. ET31 minutes ago
Reporting from New York
At the Security Council meeting on Ukraine, Sergey V. Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, blamed Europe and its pre-war support for Ukraine for Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022. He said that European leaders had sought to “whip up an anti-Russia campaign” and that, as a result, Russia “had to” start what it calls its “special military operation” against Ukraine.
Lavrov said that Russia was prepared to achieve a “lasting, just peace” with Ukraine. But he said there would be no pause in Russia’s operations, accusing Europe of wanting a cease-fire to “pump” Ukraine full of weapons.
Sept. 23, 2026, 12:05 p.m. ET58 minutes ago
Reporting from the General Assembly in New York
Rubio also said that President Trump had spoken the previous evening with Delcy Rodríguez, who has led Venezuela since the United States seized President Nicolás Maduro in January, and that Trump had discussed building up Venezuela’s economy and laying the foundation for a political transition in the country. Rubio said that an economic crisis would endanger “the survival of a democracy there, which is ultimately what we want to see in Venezuela.” He added that he knew nothing of recent efforts by María Corina Machado, the Venezuelan opposition leader, to try to return to Venezuela and the roadblocks she has encountered.
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Sept. 23, 2026, 11:53 a.m. ET1 hour ago
Reporting from the General Assembly in New York
Secretary of State Marco Rubio, speaking to reporters outside at the Lotte Palace Hotel in New York, described the indirect talks between U.S. and Iranian officials held on the sidelines of the General Assembly on Tuesday, telling reporters that the American negotiators had focused on trying to persuade Iran to end any ambition to develop a nuclear weapon.
Sept. 23, 2026, 11:43 a.m. ET1 hour ago
President Javier Milei of Argentina dedicated a significant portion of his address to bashing the United Nations and urging for A.I. deregulation.
He called the U.N. a “useless organization” whose only purpose was to sustain a cast of “fatally arrogant parasites masquerading as well-intentioned bureaucrats.” A strong ally of President Trump, he criticized the organization for voting against Israel and for its handling of the coronavirus pandemic.
He also accused the U.N. of looking “the other way” on the situation of the Malvinas islands, using Argentina’s name for the Falklands, a self-governing British territory. Argentina has asserted sovereignty over the sparsely populated archipelago in the South Atlantic for about two centuries, disputing British control for nearly as long.
Milei, a self-described libertarian with little nationalist history, had initially avoided confrontation with Britain. But his government has taken an increasingly forceful stance this year, particularly as the islands have moved closer to becoming an oil producer. “For us, the Malvinas are a national cause,” Milei said.
Sept. 23, 2026, 11:34 a.m. ET1 hour ago
Reporting from New York
“Russia is lashing out at Europe in its entirety” as part of its war on Ukraine, France’s foreign minister, Jean-Noël Barrot, told the Security Council. He accused Russia of “besmirching” the Council on which it hold a permanent seat by violating international law with attacks on Ukrainian civilians and infrastructure, as well as intruding on neighboring countries’ airspace with drones, among other actions.
Sept. 23, 2026, 11:25 a.m. ET2 hours ago
Reporting from New York
The Security Council meeting on Ukraine began with a call for “urgent steps” to end attacks by both sides on civilians and energy infrastructure, voiced by Rosemary DiCarlo, an American who serves as an under secretary general at the U.N. and heads its Department of Political and Peacebuilding Affairs. She cited an “escalation in human suffering” and said there were “cascading consequences” from the war that extended far beyond the countries directly involved, including impeding agricultural exports and threatening global food security.
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Sept. 23, 2026, 11:20 a.m. ET2 hours ago
Reporting from Kyiv, Ukraine
When President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine addressed the United Nations General Assembly for the first time after Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022, his appeal for international support was fueled by raw moral indignation.
Mass graves in the newly liberated Ukrainian city of Izium had just been uncovered, and the atrocities in Bucha and other reclaimed towns continued to shock the international community. “A crime has been committed against Ukraine, and we demand just punishment,” he declared in a prerecorded video address.
When Mr. Zelensky takes the stage on Wednesday, he will no longer be pleading merely to awaken the world to the war’s horrors, but also demanding the means for his nation to survive and warning that the violence will not remain confined to Ukraine.
On Tuesday, he met with President Trump on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in New York and said that he hoped Russia’s war in his country would end “before winter” and that the Trump administration would help Kyiv do it.
“I think we need to do this as quick as possible — before winter,” Mr. Zelensky said. Mr. Trump nodded and repeated his words with approval.
Mr. Zelensky’s speech will most likely revisit core themes from his previous addresses, including global food security, the urgent need for advanced air defenses, and warnings about the proliferation of artificial intelligence and autonomous weapons systems in warfare.
“We are now living through the most destructive arms race in human history,” he told the General Assembly last year.
The early consequences of that race are already clear. Escalating destructive capabilities on both sides can been seen in brutal frontline combat that kills or wounds thousands of soldiers every month and in relentless long-range bombardment campaigns.
Mr. Zelensky is also expected to reinforce his consistent message that Russia’s aggression will not stop at Ukraine’s borders.
Moscow is already testing how far it can push abroad, analysts say, strangling global grain routes to pressure the developing world while waging a brazen campaign of arson, sabotage, and cyberattacks across Europe.
Mr. Zelensky has frequently argued that Russia and its key partners — North Korea and Iran — seek to dismantle the American-led security architecture established after World War II and are the primary agents of chaos in a world beset by crises.
His diplomacy faces added complexity, however, given Mr. Trump’s disdain for the traditional alliances that served as the backbone of global stability.
Mr. Zelensky must navigate a delicate political line: invoking what were once the foundational values of American foreign policy without alienating an administration pursuing an approach starkly different from its predecessors.
As America has pulled back from its traditional role, European democracies have struggled to fill the void.
Mr. Zelensky is expected to argue once more that securing the continent requires defeating Russian forces in Ukraine and degrading Moscow’s capacity to wage war.
Four years after the invasion, civilian casualties from Russian strikes have surged. through a relentless daily toll: a family killed when a missile hit its home at midnight; two people killed in a drone strike at a gas station; five dead after a public bus is struck.
As Ukraine prepares for what may be the most challenging winter of the war, Mr. Zelensky must convey the critical urgency of his nation’s plight to world leaders increasingly distracted by competing global crises and domestic political pressures.
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Sept. 23, 2026, 11:07 a.m. ET2 hours ago
Reporting from New York
The United Nations Security Council has begun a meeting to discuss peace and security in Ukraine. Later in the day, Volodymyr Zelensky, the country’s president, will be speaking before the General Assembly.
Before the Council meeting, Zelensky posted on social media about overnight Russian attacks on Kyiv, his country’s capital, and other regions. He called on allies to support Ukraine by applying financial pressure on Russia through sanctions. “At every meeting during the U.N. General Assembly, we are working to ensure continued support for Ukraine,” he wrote.
Sept. 23, 2026, 11:01 a.m. ET2 hours ago
Nearly 200 world leaders get a lectern and two microphones to make their point at the United Nations General Assembly. The 1,000 or so lower-ranking diplomats in the hall have to settle for more limited options for self-expression: Stay seated or leave.
Walking out has become something of a tradition in recent years. On Wednesday, the lone U.S. diplomat in the hall left his seat as President Masoud Pezeshkian of Iran accused the United States of targeting his country’s civilians. It was a mirror image of the day before, when the Iranian delegations’ seats were nearly empty as President Trump described the choice he said he faced with Iran: make a peace deal or “annihilate” the country.
The Cuban delegation also exercised its right to leave the hall on Wednesday. As Mr. Trump labeled the country a “failed state” and vowed to bring about the downfall of its government, four Cubans stood up and walked briskly to the exit.
Rosa Freedman, a professor of law at the University of Reading in England who specializes in the United Nations, said walkouts were a permitted form of diplomatic protest that U.N. delegates had practiced for decades. “So long as it’s done peacefully, then there are no rules that prevent states from walking in and out,” she said.
For over 70 years, walk out they have. During the throes of Algeria’s war for independence from France throughout the 1950s, French diplomats left the hall when the body raised the conflict — something Paris held was none of the U.N.’s concern. In 1956, Hungary’s delegation walked out of the General Assembly after the Soviet invasion of Budapest. When South Africa’s foreign minister defended his country’s system of racial apartheid in a speech during the 1964 session, diplomats from about 40 countries staged a walkout.
When President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran repeated incendiary conspiracy theories in 2010, suggesting that the United States had orchestrated the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, delegates from over 30 countries walked out, including the American diplomats.
Last year, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel delivered his address before a sea of empty chairs, as many diplomats refused to take their seats in protest of Israel’s war in Gaza. Once Mr. Netanyahu started speaking, the number of diplomats who walked out was so high that they had to form a line to reach the exit.
Conducted peacefully, Professor Freedman said, walkouts are an important expression of freedom of speech and assembly, hallmarks of the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted soon after the body’s founding. She also noted that in comparison to parliamentary chambers, the General Assembly can be hectic.
“People are constantly walking in and out of the rooms and walking around the rooms, sometimes on mobile phones,” she said. “The filing out from the room in protest does not have the same level disruption as it would do in a parliamentary body, where everyone keeps their seat for the duration of a session.”
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Sept. 23, 2026, 10:53 a.m. ET2 hours ago
Farnaz Fassihi and Michael Levenson
In his speech, Pezeshkian contended that Iranians had been demonstrating “every night” over the past seven months in support of their country. While hardline supporters of the Islamic Republic have held nightly rallies since the start of the war, the same crowds have attacked Pezeshkian and opposed a deal with the U.S. A large portion of the Iranian population who oppose the regime also took to the streets in a nationwide uprising in January, before the war began. The authorities killed at least 4,200 protesters, rights groups say.
Sept. 23, 2026, 10:40 a.m. ET2 hours ago
Reporting from New York
Pezeshkian ended his speech by saying: “We will never bow our heads or bend our knees. We are ready for dialogue, diplomacy and negotiations but will never accept the language of force.”
Sept. 23, 2026, 10:33 a.m. ET3 hours ago
Reporting from New York
Pezeshkian suggested that there was a double standard in the international community. “Israel kills, but Iran is subject to sanctions,” he said. “This is a true tragedy, which would make anyone hearing it laugh, at best.”
Sept. 23, 2026, 10:32 a.m. ET3 hours ago
Reporting from New York
Pezeshkian criticized Israel for its attacks on Iran. Israel has been a focus for every Middle Eastern leader who has addressed the Assembly so far, who have have expressed anger at the Israeli military’s actions against Palestinians as well as its attacks on Iran, Lebanon and Syria.
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Sept. 23, 2026, 10:27 a.m. ET3 hours ago
Reporting from New York
Pezeshkian reiterated Iran’s long-held position that the U.S. military must leave the Middle East. “Our regional issues must be resolved in the region, at the hands of countries in the region, without becoming toys of outside powers,” he said.
Sept. 23, 2026, 10:26 a.m. ET3 hours ago
Reporting from New York
“For our country, peaceful nuclear technology is part of our inherent progress,” Pezeshkian said.
Sept. 23, 2026, 10:25 a.m. ET3 hours ago
Reporting from New York
Pezeshkian said Iran did not want a nuclear weapon but would not accept limitations on its civilian nuclear program. Iran’s nuclear program has been at the heart of the standoff between Tehran and Washington. Iran insists that any deal must allow it to enrich uranium to the levels needed for use in medical research and electricity. Washington opposes any enrichment.
Sept. 23, 2026, 10:21 a.m. ET3 hours ago
Reporting from New York
Iran’s president, Masoud Pezeshkian, portrayed his country as a victim of U.S.-Israeli aggression and signaled his country’s defiance. “Iran must be powerful to avoid being threatened, to avoid its future being threatened, he said. “Our defensive systems have been built so that no one can think that bombing Iranian cities will go unanswered.”
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Sept. 23, 2026, 10:19 a.m. ET3 hours ago
Reporting from New York
Iran’s president, Masoud Pezeshkian, has begun his speech at the General Assembly. He held up pictures of Iran’s former supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was killed on the first day of U.S and Israeli strikes on Iran on Feb. 28. He also held up a picture of Iranian schoolchildren killed the same day in separate U.S. strikes.
Sept. 23, 2026, 10:19 a.m. ET3 hours ago
Reporting from New York
The lone representative of the United States in the Assembly hall walked out as Pezeshkian spoke of the war’s civilian casualties and accused the U.S. and Israel of targeting Iran’s civilian infrastructure in violation of international law.
Sept. 23, 2026, 9:51 a.m. ET3 hours ago
Reporting from the General Assembly in New York
Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Sergey V. Lavrov, the foreign minister of Russia, met on Wednesday morning in New York, on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly. They did not say anything to reporters at the start of their meeting. On Tuesday, President Trump said he thought the presidents of Russia and Ukraine, Vladimir V. Putin and Volodymyr Zelensky, could reach a deal soon to end Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. A top Putin aide said this month that the Russian leader could meet with Trump and Xi Jinping, the Chinese leader, in China in November.
Sept. 23, 2026, 9:24 a.m. ET4 hours ago
Syria reporter
President Al-Sharaa directly addressed Syria’s increasingly tense relationship with Israel, saying Damascus had opened the door to diplomacy even as Israel carried out hundreds of airstrikes and incursions into Syria over the past two years.
“The world is overjoyed about our return, but Israel is launching attacks against Syria,” he said.
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Sept. 23, 2026, 9:23 a.m. ET4 hours ago
Reporting from New York
The General Assembly hall is emptier on Wednesday, the second day of addresses. The gathered world leaders and delegations hold bilateral meetings at U.N. headquarters and attend side events. The U.N. said 166 events were scheduled this week and member states had submitted 1,553 requests to use U.N. rooms for meetings. The Assembly draws a huge number of delegates; this year 18,000 people were credentialed as delegates.
Sept. 23, 2026, 9:20 a.m. ET4 hours ago
Syria reporter
President Ahmad al-Sharaa of Syria, speaking first among the world leaders on Wednesday, opened his address by listing his government’s record in its first two years: U.S. sanctions lifted, diplomatic ties restored and stability maintained in Syria even as war engulfed much of the region.
“Syria has restored its status in the international community,” he said. “We proved to the world that the security of the region has to start in Damascus.”