Biden heads to New York to meet world leaders at the UN

President Joe Biden travels to New York City on Tuesday to meet with world leaders at the UN General Assembly meeting where Ukraine and the food shortages resulting from Russia’s war there will headline the summit.

In addition to that conflict, Iran’s nuclear program and Chinese aggression will top the agenda for the American president. 

Biden arrives late to the gathering. The president of the United States traditionally gets the number two speaking slot on Tuesday but Biden pushed his speech to the general assembly to Wednesday so he could attend Queen Elizabeth’s funeral.

He arrives after the White House had to clean up his comment to CBS’ 60 Minutes that the US would come to Taiwan’s aid if China invaded. U.S. officials said American policy hasn’t changed. 

He’ll head straight to a fundraiser for the Democratic Party when he arrives in New York City on Tuesday evening. 

And he hits the ground running on Wednesday with a full schedule of events. On Thursday he’ll attend another party fundraiser before heading back to Washington D.C. 

In New York on Wednesday, President Biden will host his first meeting with new British Prime Minister Liz Truss

Biden, on Wednesday, will hold his first sitdown with new British Prime Minister Liz Truss. Truss, in route to New York, kicked off her first visit to America as PM with the announcement that a U.K-U.S. free trade deal is not going to happen for years.

Truss said such an agreement simply wasn’t a priority. 

‘There (aren’t) currently any negotiations taking place with the U.S., and I don´t have an expectation that those are going to start in the short to medium term,’ she told reporters.

The UN General Assembly meeting began on Tuesday. About 157 heads of state and representatives of governments will deliver speeches to the General Assembly from Tuesday through Sunday.

Last year, in his remarks, Biden worked to re-establish America’s place as a global leader after Donald Trump’s four years of ‘America first’ isolationist policy. 

This year, Biden is expected to renew his call for unity when it comes to supporting the Ukraine. He’ll also address the fallout from the Russian invasion including rising prices for food and energy along with the inflation that has come in its waek.

The Biden administration will also co-host a food security summit with the African Union and EU.

Earlier this week, U.N. Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield outlined three U.S. priorities for gatherinig: address global food insecurity; advance global health and global health security; uphold the U.N. Charter and shaping the future of the United Nations.

‘We believe this is a moment to defend the United Nations and to demonstrate to the world that it can still take the world’s most pressing global challenges on,’ she said.

The gathering will also be notable for who is not there. Russian President Vladimir Putin, Chinese President Xi Jinping, and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be represented by deputies instead of attending themselves.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky will address the forum remotely on Wednesday. 

And, despite the American focus on renewing the Iran nuclear deal, Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi said he has no plans to meet with President Biden on the sidelines of the general assembly meeting.

‘There is no plan for a meeting or negotiations with U.S leaders,’ Raisi said before he left Tehran. ‘We have no plans whatsoever for meeting them.’

Trump removed the U.S. from the 2015 nuclear deal. Talks between Tehran and Washington remain stalled. Biden supports a return to the deal, which would see sanctions lifted against Iran in exchange for it restricting its rapidly advancing nuclear program.

Raisi told CBS’ 60 Minutes that Iran needed ‘guarantees’ before returning the nuclear pact.

‘We cannot trust the Americans because of the behavior that we have already seen from them. That is why if there is no guarantee, there is no trust,’ he said.

The Biden administration counters that it can’t make any promises about what future presidents will do. 

The 77th Session of the United Nations is returning to normal operations after two years of upheaval during the covid pandemic.  

In 2020, the annual gathering was held virtually. Last year, the format was a mixture of in-person attendance and prerecorded speeches.

The war in Ukraine will top the agenda for UNGA: above a Ukrainian artilleryman works on a 2S3 Akatsiya self-propelled howitzer in Mykolaiv region

The annual U.N. General Assembly meeting began on Tuesday; above King of Jordan Abdullah II bin Al-Hussein addresses the assembly

Street closures in New York around UNGA 

The world leaders will have a packed agenda, António Guterres, the secretary-general of the United Nations, said last week

‘The General Assembly is meeting at a time of great peril,’ he noteed. ‘Our world is blighted by war, battered by climate chaos, scarred by hate, and shamed by poverty, hunger, and inequality.’