US President Donald Trump's administration has approved visas for top Iranian officials, including the president and foreign minister, to attend next weeks' United Nations General Assembly meeting in New York even as the two countries are locked in a stalemated war.
The US State Department said on Thursday that it had approved visas for Iran's "core delegation" along with essential staffers to participate in the UN meetings.
The core delegation includes President Masoud Pezeshkian and Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi, according to US officials who spoke on condition of anonymity due to visa privacy laws.
The move is unusual due to the more than six-month-long conflict between Iran and the United States and no sign that agreements to reopen the Strait of Hormuz or return to talks on Iran's nuclear program are close.
The United States has imposed significant sanctions against Iran and launched a new campaign in recent weeks aimed at severing "critical financial lifelines".
As the host country for the United Nations headquarters, the US is generally limited in what it can do to prevent foreign leaders from coming to the General Assembly.
However, it has in the past denied visas to - or discouraged applications from - leaders involved in active conflicts with the United States.
For last year's UN meetings of world leaders - which took place before the Iran war began on February 28 but after the US and Israel launched air strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities in June 2025 - the State Department also approved a limited number of visas for Iranian diplomats but also imposed rigid restrictions on the delegation's movements.
Those included severe limitations on how far Iranian officials could travel in New York City from their UN mission and barred them from shopping at wholesale membership stores such as Costco and Sam's Club.
The decision on the Iranian visas was announced just a day after the State Department denied visas to Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas and his delegation to come to the General Assembly.
“Consistent with our host country obligations, the core delegation from the Iranian regime will be able to attend UN General Assembly High Level week," the State Department said.
"The delegation will be under travel restrictions and will face prohibitions on the purchase of luxury and other goods per our policy. The delegation is smaller than last year.”
The department accused the Palestinian Authority - which administers parts of the Israeli-occupied West Bank - of trying to "internationalise" the Israel-Hamas war in the Gaza Strip by bringing cases to the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court as well as continuing to pay stipends to prisoners jailed in Israel for attacks on Israelis.
