Iran Calls on UN Security Council to Condemn Israeli Attack on Consulate

Tuesday, 02 April 2024 6:46 PM

Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian has held a phone conversation with UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres regarding the deadly Israeli strike on Iran's Consulate in Syria.

Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian has called on the UN Security Council to take "appropriate and explicit action" to condemn the deadly Israeli attack on Iran's consulate in the Syrian capital, Damascus.

In a post on X on Tuesday, Amir-Abdollahian said he reminded UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres in a phone call that the United Nations and its Security Council bear the responsibility of ensuring the international peace and security.

"I demanded an appropriate and explicit reaction from the UN Security Council in condemning the recent crime of the Zionist regime in the terrorist attack on the consular section of our country's embassy in Damascus and the assassination of official Iranian military advisers and Syrian citizens," he said.

Guterres’ spokesman Stephane Dujarric said in a statement on Tuesday that the UN chief “reaffirms that the principle of the inviolability of diplomatic and consular premises and personnel must be respected in all cases in accordance with international law.”

Israeli warplanes bombed the Iranian consulate, situated next to the embassy building in Damascus’s Mezzeh district, on Monday afternoon.

Iran's Islamic Revolution Guards Corps named Brigadier General Mohammad Reza Zahedi, a commander of the IRGC’s Quds Force, and his deputy General Mohammad Hadi Haji Rahimi were among the seven martyrs of the terrorist attack.

“Any miscalculation could lead to broader conflict in an already volatile region, with devastating consequences for civilians who are already seeing unprecedented suffering in Syria, Lebanon, the Occupied Palestinian Territory, and the broader Middle East,” the statement said.

The Foreign Ministry has underscored the Islamic Republic’s legitimate right to a decisive response based on international law.

“The secretary-general further calls on all concerned to exercise utmost restraint and avoid further escalation,” Dujarric said.

In a letter sent to Guterres and the UN Security Council’s President Vanessa Frazier, Iran’s UN mission had demanded denunciation of the Israeli regime’s “heinous and abhorrent terrorist attack” that killed seven military advisors of the IRGC. 

Elsewhere in his statement, Dujarric said Guterres had received a call from the Iranian foreign minister regarding Israel’s strike.

“We communicate with the parties through different channels. We are concerned about the possible escalation of tensions beyond what we have seen so far,” Dujarric said.

The Security Council is also set to hold an emergency meeting, at Russia’s request, over the Israeli strike on Tuesday afternoon, said Russia’s first deputy envoy to the UN Dmitry Polyansky.

Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei has vowed that Iran will “punish” Israel and make the evil regime “regret” its crime of assassinating the country's military advisors in Syria.

Iran’s President Ebrahim Raeisi has also said Israel had resorted to indiscriminate assassinations after back-to-back failures in the face of the resistance, warning that the regime’s latest crime against Iranian military advisers in Syria “will not go unanswered.”