Iran’s foreign minister meets with peace-making group

Iran’s foreign minister has travelled to Geneva for a previously undisclosed meeting hosted by a leading humanitarian group that works to strike peace agreements.

Hossein Amirabdollahian spoke with the U.N.'s top humanitarian aid official, Martin Griffiths, in a meeting at the Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue, which made headlines five years ago for its role in an accord in which the Basque separatist group ETA agreed to dissolve after a decades-long campaign in Spain, officials said.

The centre said in a message sent to The Associated Press on Wednesday that it “routinely convenes closed-door consultations to support conflict mediation and resolution in various parts of the world." “In the latest of these consultations, HD hosted a senior Iranian delegation and other invited guests for a discussion about Gaza focused on ways to alleviate human suffering, increase humanitarian assistance and reduce risks of escalation in the region,” the statement said.

The Israeli ambassador in Geneva, Meirav Eilon Shahar, said, “Israel expresses its indignation that the foreign minister of Iran is in Geneva and meeting with U.N. officials and NGOs to talk about the humanitarian situation in Gaza.'" “Iran has no place in the future of Gaza. It is part of the problem, not the solution,” she posted on X, formerly called Twitter.

Iran's Foreign Ministry said in a statement on X that “As part of his consultations in Geneva, Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian has met with a number of officials of the U.N., humanitarian organizations and religious institutions as well as university professors and some ambassadors there regarding the ongoing developments in Palestine and the Zionist regime's aggression against #Gaza.” (AP)