Security Council Hears From US, Iran, and Dissidents

After weeks of escalating tension, US and Iranian officials faced each other Thursday at the UN Security Council, and a dissident dramatically told the body of her government's attempts to kill her. In the meeting, the US envoy renewed threats against the Islamic Republic despite President Trump's earlier efforts to lower the temperature between the two adversaries, the AP reports. And Iran's deputy UN ambassador accused the US of "direct involvement in steering unrest in Iran to violence," per Deutsche Welle. Gholam Hossein Darzi argued that the US is "laying the groundwork for political destabilization and military intervention" in the Middle Eastern nation."

• US response: US Ambassador Mike Waltz dismissed the allegations that the protests are "a foreign plot to give a precursor to military action," per Reuters. Although Trump had said Wednesday that killings of protesters by the government seem to have ended, Waltz told the council that the president "has made it clear that all options are on the table to stop the slaughter. And no one should know that better than the leadership of the Iranian regime." By Thursday, the protests challenging Iran's theocracy appeared increasingly smothered, but the state-ordered internet and communication blackout remained.
• Lobbying of Trump: One diplomat told the AP that top officials from Egypt, Oman, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar had spent the past 48 hours raising concerns with Trump that a US military intervention would shake the global economy and destabilize the already volatile region.

• The dissidents: The US requested the emergency Security Council meeting and invited two Iranian dissidents, Masih Alinejad and Ahmad Batebi, to describe their experience as targets of the Islamic Republic. In a stunning moment, per the AP, Alinejad addressed the Iranian representative directly. "You have tried to kill me three times. I have seen my would-be assassin with my own eyes in front of my garden, in my home in Brooklyn," she said while the Iranian official looked directly ahead, without acknowledging her. In October, two purported Russian mobsters were each sentenced to 25 years behind bars for hiring a hit man to kill Alinejad at her New York home three years ago on behalf of the Iranian government. Batebi described the deep cuts the prison guards in Iran would inflict on him before pouring salt on his wounds. "If you do not believe me, I can show you my body right now," he told the council.
• Their pleas: Both dissidents called on the world body and the council to do more to hold Iran accountable for its human rights abuses. Batebi asked with Trump to stand by the Iranian people. "You encouraged people to go into the streets. That was a good thing. But don't leave them alone," he said.