The United States denied visas to senior government officials from Russia and Iran, respectively, that would have enabled them to take part in person at a high-level United Nations Security Council meeting on international peace and security. The refusal cast a shadow over a debate convened by China to examine the erosion of the very principles the denials appeared to violate.
Dozens of foreign ministers and other senior officials, many from global South countries as close as Cuba and as far as Turkmenistan, converged on UN headquarters in New York City on May 26 to debate “Upholding the Purposes and Principles of the UN Charter and Strengthening the UN-Centered International System”: the very bones of multilateralism.
Among those blocked from attending were a Russian deputy foreign minister, Alexander Alimov, and Iran’s Foreign Affairs Minister Abbas Araghchi, both of whom were scheduled to speak at the all-day session organized by China as part of its rotating presidency of the Security Council in May.
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi chaired the meeting.
It is a violation of the 1947 Headquarters Agreement, which requires Washington to approve entry to foreign government representatives to travel to the UN to attend meetings, for the US to deny access to the world body regardless of the status of bilateral relations.
“We view this not just as a breach by Washington of its obligations under the United Nations Headquarters Agreement, according to which access to headquarters of the United Nations needs to be provided for all officials and member states, barring none,” said Vassily Nebenzia, Russia’s permanent representative to the UN to the Security Council on May 26. “We also view this as an egregious instance of disrespect for the Chinese presidency of the Security Council.”
Nebenzia said in a separate press briefing that by denying visas, Washington was missing an opportunity to dialogue with a senior member of the Iranian government as the US and Iran remain deadlocked in the dispute over the Strait of Hormuz as well as Tehran’s nuclear-enrichment program.
“Had they invited the foreign minister, they could have used the opportunity to do what they’re doing indirectly,” Nebenzia said after the briefing, referring to Araghchi. He also said that Alimov is an expert on UN affairs and that the visa denial will be followed up by Russia.
The US mission did not respond to PassBlue’s request for comment at press time.
According to the Iranian state-run IRNA news agency, the Foreign Ministry’s spokesman, Esmail Baqaei, told the press on May 25 that Araghchi would not be traveling to New York City to participate in the Security Council meeting “due to visa issues.”
On May 26, Farhan Haq, the UN deputy spokesperson, said during his regular media briefing that as part of the Host Country Agreement, “we expect the host country [US] to issue visas to all of those who need to participate in the activities of the United Nations at our headquarters here.
I’m not aware of what the exact reason was, why Foreign Minister Araghchi is not here. I do know that he has not shown up here in New York. And as a result, he will not be meeting the Secretary-General this afternoon.”
When pressed by reporters whether visa denials by the US are increasing, Haq said: “I’m saying this isn’t the first time, and it does happen every so often. I’m an old man, so I don’t know whether my impression is wrong, but it does seem I get these questions slightly more frequently than I used to.”
Over decades, Russian diplomats have indeed been denied visas by the US to travel to the UN; most recently, the US threatened to pull the visas of Palestinian diplomats based at the UN unless Palestine’s permanent representative, Riyad Mansour, withdrew his candidacy to run for a vice president of the General Assembly.
Speaking at the Council debate, Michael DeSombre, the US assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific Affairs and representing Washington, defended the Trump administration’s record of upholding multilateralism, reciting recent examples.
On Gaza, he credited President Trump’s 20-point plan for creating the conditions that led to Security Council Resolution 2803 and the first phase of a ceasefire in the Palestinian enclave, in October 2025, even though it is constantly breached. He also highlighted the approval in March 2026 of Council Resolution 2817, which condemned Iran for attacks against Gulf Cooperation Council countries and Jordan.
“What we are working towards is not a rejection of multilateralism but putting clarity and results over inefficiency and hollow words,” DeSombre said.
Secretary-General António Guterres, speaking at the Council meeting, described a multilateral system in crisis, saying the world is burdened by geopolitical tensions, a proliferation of armed conflicts and the selective application of international law. He condemned Russia’s war in Ukraine, Israel’s unrelenting attacks in Lebanon, despite a ceasefire there, and warned against an escalation of the US-Israel war in Iran.
“The [UN] Charter remains humanity’s best hope for peace, but it is only as strong as the commitment of those responsible for upholding it,” Guterres said. “I urge all members of this Council to uphold the Charter consistently, to act in the interest of peace, to rebuild trust through leadership and compromise and to do your part to ensure that this organization and this Council truly live up to what it was meant to be, a forum for solutions, a guardian of international law and the force for peace and security.”
Wang, as Council president, called the current geopolitical moment the most complex since the end of World War II, saying that “the dark clouds of war keep gathering” and the “giant ship of human civilization is sailing into dangerous waters.”
The problem with the UN today, he added, is that the principles of the Charter are not being followed, and he called on major powers specifically to “lead by example in following the rule of law” rather than practicing “double standards, exceptionalism, or selective application.”
Ishaq Dar, Pakistan’s deputy prime minister and foreign minister, said that Council resolutions were applied when convenient and disregarded when not. Pakistan, which is an elected member of the Council, is the lead mediator on negotiations between the US and Iran to end the war in the Mideast.
“The credibility of this Council is eroded when powerful states act outside the law,” he said. “Smaller states are left to wonder whether the Charter protects all nations equally.”
Indonesia’s Foreign Minister Sugiono told the Council that “history will not judge us by the speeches we deliver in this chamber, but by whether we act when innocent lives are being destroyed before the very eyes of the world. When we fail to act, we fail the Charter.”
Liberia’s foreign minister, Gbehzohngar Findley, described the victims of all conflicts around the world as the true constituents of the UN. “It represents the mother in Sudan who has fled from her home three times,” she said. “It represents a child in Gaza who has known no day of life without fear. It represents a civilian in Ukraine who has to endure another winter of war.”
Damilola Banjo is an award-winning staff reporter for PassBlue who has covered a wide range of topics, from Africa-centered stories to gender equality to UN peacekeeping and US-UN relations. She also oversees all video production for PassBlue. She was a Dag Hammarskjold fellow in 2023 and a Pulitzer Center postgraduate fellow in 2021. She was part of the BBC Africa team that produced the Emmy-nominated documentary, “Sex for Grades.” In addition, she worked for WFAE, an NPR affiliate in Charlotte, N.C. Banjo has a master’s of science degree from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism and an undergraduate degree from the University of Ibadan in Nigeria.
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Damilola, thank you for a great contribution. I am just worried to see that anytime people talk about the UN the words– power or powerful will follow, as this gives me the impression that the UN Charter is for the powerless and small countries and does not apply to the powerful 5 countries in the P5. That has made the UN a real Jungle where the powerful reigns! On the issue of conflicts affecting the world, les ut honestly say who are behind these conflicts sponsoring them and helping one side against the other? The response is clear it is countries which have weapon industries and their hidden hands of imperialism! To the answer of Michel DeSombre and his words regarding the support of the USA to multilateralisme, I think that he has to look at the every day situation in Gaza, in Libanon, in the West Bank to understand that nothing has changed despite the ceasefires signed and the creation of the hallo Gaza Board of Peace because every day babies, children, women, and men are killed and their homes and health facilities destroyed in these territoires by Israel using American bombs! If the US is pushing to sign ceasefire by one hand it is also giving to Israel bombs by the other to continue human killings and destruction! That is not multilateralism! That is not respect for the UN Charter!