Beirut<\/a> declared Mohammad Reza Shibani persona non grata.<\/p>\nUnder Article 9 of the Vienna Convention, \u201cThe receiving State may at any time and without having to explain its decision, notify the sending State that the head of the mission or any member of the diplomatic staff of the mission is persona non grata or that any other member of the staff of the mission is not acceptable. In any such case, the sending State shall, as appropriate, either recall the person concerned or terminate his functions with the mission… If the sending State refuses or fails within a reasonable period to carry out its obligations under paragraph 1 of this article, the receiving State may refuse to recognize the person concerned as a member of the mission.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/6e8fd0dd63d8486195fa506da1d683c6.jpeg\"\/)
<\/p>\n
A view of United Nations Headquarters before members of the UN Security Council meet to vote on a draft resolution to authorize an International Stabilization Force in Gaza, on November 17, 2025 in New York City. (credit: Adam Gray\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n
Lt.-Col. (res.) Sarit Zehavi, the founder and president of the Alma Research and Education Center, told The Jerusalem Post that she was unsure if the letter was a sign that Beirut is ready to confront Iran\u2019s influence in the country, but said she thought it was likely an indicator Lebanon was \u201cafraid\u201d of \u201cdirect confrontation\u201d if it challenged Iran.<\/p>\n
While Beirut may be seeking help from the UN to enforce international conventions on Iran, Zehavi warned that the UN’s \u201ccapability to enforce anything is very, very low\u201d and Iran\u2019s allies will likely \u201cget into the picture\u201d there.<\/p>\n
IRGC accused of illegal acts against Lebanon<\/p>\n
The letter also accused Iran\u2019s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) of \u201cillegal acts committed in open defiance of decisions by the Lebanese government.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tehran alleged that it informed Beirut of the presence of its officials in Beirut\u2019s Ramada Hotel, which Israel struck in March. In addition to hosting key commanders of Iran’s elite Quds Force of the Revolutionary Guards, the hotel was also holding a number of individuals displaced by the war, some of whom were injured in the attack.<\/p>\n
The foreign ministry denied that it had coordinated the IRGC visit with the Iranian embassy and disclosed that some of those killed were not registered as diplomats, which also violates the Vienna Convention. In particular, Beirut denied knowing that Ahmad Rasouli and Amir Moradi, two of those killed, were in the country.<\/p>\n
Rasouli had the senior position of chief of intelligence in the IRGC\u2019s Palestine Corps, and images of Moradi, released by Iranian state media after his death, showed him in IRGC military garb.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Iranian conduct, namely, deploying Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps personnel in Lebanon under the guise of diplomatic activity, violates the principle of good faith,\u201d the Lebanese UN representative wrote.<\/p>\n
Article 10, as noted by the letter, requires states to inform the host country of \u201cThe appointment of members of the mission, their arrival and their final departure or the termination of their functions with the mission.\u201d<\/p>\n
Finally, Beirut complained that the IRGC\u2019s March 11 announcement of joint operations with Hezbollah was \u201chighly concerning.\u201d In \u201cOperation Eaten Straw,\u201d Hezbollah planned to launch around 600 rockets and missiles in coordination with Iran at Israeli territory, according to the Institute for National Security Studies.<\/p>\n
This allegedly coordinated attack came less than two weeks after Beirut banned Hezbollah from carrying out military activities.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The founder and president of the Alma Research and Education Center warned that the UN’s \u201ccapability to enforce…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":114581,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[847,34,424,39592,14477,16505,93,9117,69,1243,39591],"class_list":{"0":"post-114580","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tehran","8":"tag-beirut","9":"tag-iran","10":"tag-irgc","11":"tag-lebanese-foreign-ministry","12":"tag-lebanese-media","13":"tag-lebanese-territory","14":"tag-lebanon","15":"tag-security-council","16":"tag-tehran","17":"tag-united-nations","18":"tag-vienna-convention"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@iran\/116576114756767553","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114580","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=114580"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114580\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/114581"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=114580"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=114580"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=114580"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}