The opening speech by the UN secretary general, António Guterres, on Tuesday was pretty well attended. Brazil’s president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, also drew a decent crowd, but he may have been just the warm-up act for Donald Trump, who addressed the 81st UN general assembly in New York.
Smaller audiences for several leaders
Not so many stayed around to hear France’s president, Emmanuel Macron, and fewer still for his South Korean counterpart, Lee Jae Myung. Japan’s prime minister, Sanae Takaichi, also spoke to a fairly small gathering, as did her UK counterpart, Andy Burnham, who was making his general assembly debut.
Wednesday’s proceedings
Syria’s president, Ahmed al-Sharaa, kicked off Wednesday’s proceedings quietly. But perhaps unsurprisingly, his Iranian counterpart, Masoud Pezeshkian, drew a bit more of a crowd, as did Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
Several delegates made a show of walking out before Benjamin Netanyahu, prime minister of Israel, spoke.
