Trump to meet with Venezuela’s interim president, other leaders during UN General Assembly: Official

(WASHINGTON) — President Donald Trump is set to visit the U.N. General Assembly next week, where he will address the international organization and meet with global leaders, according to U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Mike Waltz.

Trump will address the assembly on Tuesday and then have meetings with global leaders, Waltz said. Most notably, the president will meet face-to-face with Venezuela’s interim leader Delcy Rodriguez in a pull-aside meeting.

It will be the first time that the leaders will meet since the U.S. operation in Venezuela that captured then-President Nicolas Maduro earlier this year. It also comes weeks after Trump announced that the U.S. and Venezuela reached a deal that he said would give the U.S. majority control of billions of barrels of oil reserves in the Caribbean country.

Other leaders Trump will meet with include United Kingdom Prime Minister Andy Burnham, Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, and, in a multilateral meeting, the leaders of Gulf countries including Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, according to Waltz.

On Trump’s meeting with the Gulf leaders, a senior administration official told reporters that the president will hear concerns from Gulf countries about the Iran war directly. 

“In one way or another, we expect the Iranian regime to abandon its pursuit of a nuclear weapon, so I think just continuing to have that engagement and that diplomacy with our Gulf partners in that meeting will be incredibly important,” the senior administration official said. “But also, as you all know, the president truly values hearing from them and hearing their concerns. His engagement with them is ongoing and important, but hearing from them as a group will be incredibly important.”  

The official said Iran would be a “key topic” in Trump’s conversations at the General Assembly.

Trump’s address to the U.N. on Tuesday will highlight how his administration has “confronted complex problems head-on,” Waltz said.

“We expect the president will highlight how he has, in his administration … confronted complex problems head-on around the world, many of the peace deals that he has driven to conclusion or is in the process of driving to conclusion,” Waltz told reporters.

“He will touch on the importance of ensuring that Iran never has a nuclear weapon, which is not only demanded by the United States, has been demanded by the U.N. Security Council and repeated resolutions, and he’ll talk about some of the United States’ accomplishments in over the past year, since the last time he was here, including in the Western Hemisphere, progress on the president’s 20-point peace plan in Gaza, and more,” Waltz added.

During his hourlong address at the General Assembly last year, Trump lambasted the leaders gathered in the conference hall, saying, “Your countries are going to hell,” while touting the work of his administration.

The president also accused the U.N. of not living up to its promise.

“What is the purpose of the United Nations?” Trump asked. “It has such tremendous, tremendous potential. But it’s not even coming close to living up to that potential.”

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