TEHRAN – Iran's Deputy Foreign Minister for Legal and International Affairs, Kazem Gharibabadi, delivered a scathing critique of the international community's failure to achieve nuclear disarmament, specifically targeting Israel's nuclear weapons program during a speech at the UN General Assembly's High-Level Plenary Meeting on the International Day for the Total Elimination of Nuclear Weapons. 

Gharibabadi, echoing the frustration of many non-nuclear-weapon states, expressed deep disappointment at the lack of progress towards nuclear disarmament. "Seventy-five years after the U.S. dropped atomic bombs on innocent civilians in Hiroshima and Nagasaki," he stated, "this meeting offers a unique opportunity to mobilize global efforts toward achieving nuclear disarmament as the highest disarmament priority of the United Nations, even in the absence of some nuclear weapon states."

He pointed to the hypocrisy of nuclear-weapon states, who, despite their commitments to disarmament under Article VI of the NPT, continue to invest heavily in modernizing and expanding their arsenals. "Nuclear-weapon states, particularly those within NATO, present extensive rhetoric about their commitment to nuclear disarmament as a future goal," Gharibabadi said, "while making firm demands on the rest of the world for immediate commitments to nuclear non-proliferation." 

Gharibabadi highlighted the discriminatory application of NPT rules by nuclear-weapon states, who perpetuate an unequal world order where they retain their nuclear arsenals while demanding non-proliferation from others. "Today, more than 40 countries, including NATO members rely on the extended nuclear deterrence provided by the United States," he stated, pointing to the "nuclear sharing" arrangements where five NATO states host U.S. nuclear weapons, circumventing NPT obligations. 

He then turned his focus to Israel, the only entity in West Asia to possess nuclear weapons. "The Israeli regime," he declared, "the sole possessor of a nuclear arsenal in our region, with the backing of the United States, has consistently opposed all initiatives, including Iran’s proposal since 1974, to establish a nuclear-weapon-free zone in West Asia." 

Gharibabadi accused Israel of "openly threatening others with nuclear annihilation" while falsely accusing others of proliferation. He emphasized that Israel's continued refusal to join the NPT and subject itself to international safeguards is a serious threat to regional security. 

"To prove a genuine will for the total elimination of nuclear weapons," Gharibabadi asserted, "the international community has to compel Israel—an outlaw regime that has openly threatened others with nuclear annihilation while falsely accusing others of proliferation—to renounce its nuclear weapons, join the NPT as a non-nuclear-weapon party, and subject all its nuclear facilities and activities to comprehensive IAEA safeguards, given its six decades of deception and clandestine nuclear weapons development."