US Refuses Visa for Chairman of Group-15 Nations

21 September 2007

Tehran-The US refused visa for chairman of the 'Group 15' member states Alireza Moayeri, a statement from the Geneva secretariat of the group said on Saturday.

Moayeri was supposed to attend meeting of foreign ministers of the 'Group 15' on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York next Friday and present an annual report on activities of the member states.

"The US administration, again, acted out of political motive about presence of international delegations and independent states representatives in the United Nations meeting. Unfortunately, instead of applying international policy and method, the US limited activities of the UN member states by taking such measures," said a statement in protest at the visa refusal.

In the past years, the US government failed to honor its undertakings as the UN host country in terms of granting visa for representatives of the UN member states citing visa refusal for Iran's Majlis speaker to attend world parliamentary speakers meeting and many others senior officials of the independent countries to attend the meetings of the different UN bodies in New York.

"Applying such unilateral methods would affect the UN independent and free activities. Now the time is appropriate to the UN General Assembly to take necessary step to specify another place to convene meetings of the United Nations," the statement added.