A spokesman for António Guterres said at a press briefing that the United Nations secretary-general’s letter congratulating the Islamic Republic on its “national holiday,” marking the 1979 Islamic revolution’s anniversary, was “standard” protocol at the global body and “has been a tradition for decades.”
“Every year, each member state gets the exact same letter congratulating on their national holiday and conveying best wishes to the people of that country,” Stéphane Dujarric told Efrat Lachter, who covers the global body for Fox News Digital, of the U.N. head’s note to Masoud Pezeshkian, president of Iran.
“The letters went out yesterday to Iran, Gambia and Lithuania, if I’m not mistaken,” he said at the Feb. 11 briefing. “It’s a decades-long tradition,” he added, and “it should not be interpreted by anyone who receives it as an endorsement of whatever policies that government may be putting in place.”
“It doesn’t change the secretary-general’s view of the crackdown that we saw in Iran, which he called ‘horrendous’ given the level of violence and deaths that we saw,” Dujarric said.
In the letters to countries on their national days, Guterres appears to offer his “warmest greetings” to the countries. JNS viewed the letter that the U.N. head sent to Israel on May 1, 2025. The letter had different language, wishing the Israeli president “greetings” on Independence Day and conveying “my best wishes to the people of the State of Israel on this special day.”
It wasn’t clear if the secretary-general intended to send Israel a letter this year with the language from his 2025 note to the Jewish state, or that of the letters to Iran, Gambia and Lithuania this year.
It took weeks after the Iranian regime killed civilian protesters—with estimates of the numbers of victims ranging from thousands to tens of thousands—before Guterres publicly stated his concern.
The U.N. Human Rights Council, on which sit some of the worst human rights violators, elected to hold a meeting on Iran in late January.
The council condemned the regime’s attacks and mandated further investigation.
Abbas Araghchi, Iranian foreign minister, is scheduled to address the council on Feb. 23. U.N. Watch and other critics of the regime have said the council should disinvite the Iranian diplomat.
Dujarric said that his boss has no say in the matter and the decision is up to the council.
“This is a membership organization. Every member state has a right to address legislative bodies,” Dujarric said at the briefing. “It’s not within the secretary-general’s authority to bar a member state from addressing a legislative body.”
