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America's ambassador to the UN has just spoken to the Security Council in New York.

Dorothy Shea says Iran "long obfuscated its nuclear weapons programme" and "stonewalled our good-faith efforts" in recent nuclear talks.

She urges the Security Council to "call on Iran to end its efforts to eradicate Israel" and to terminate its drive for nuclear weapons.

Iran has maintained its nuclear programme is for civilian purposes and not to make weapons.

Russia's ambassador to the UN has condemned the US strikes in Iran as "irresponsible, dangerous and provocative".

Vasily Nebenzya says America has "opened a Pandora's box" and that nobody knows what new catastrophes it will bring.

"The US is clearly not interested in diplomacy," he adds.

The UK's representative to the UN has just spoken at the Security Council in meeting in New York.

Barbara Woodward says this is a "pivotal moment" for the Middle East and reiterates that the UK did not take part in US or Israeli strikes on Iran.

"My prime minister has been clear," she says. "We urge Iran now to show restraint and we urge all parties to return to the negotiating table and find a diplomatic solution, which stops further escalation and brings this crisis to an end."

Woodward also calls on Tehran to "cooperate fully" with the UN's nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, in its investigations. 

Iran's foreign minister has arrived in Moscow for talks with Vladimir Putin, according to a report by Iranian state-run news agency IRNA.

Abbas Araghchi called Russia a "friend of Iran" at a news conference in Istanbul after the US attacked three of Iran's nuclear sites.

鈥淎ll options are on the table," he added of Iran's response. "I will have a discussion with them on how it should proceed.鈥�

While the UN Security Council meets in New York, Benjamin Netanyahu has been speaking to reporters in Israel.

He says Israel won't be "dragged into a war of attrition" but it also won't end its campaign in Iran prematurely.

He adds that Israel is close to achieving its goals of destroying Tehran's nuclear programme and its ballistic missiles.

On the underground Fordow nuclear plant, which the US dropped special bunker busting bombs on during its attack, Netanyahu says the site is "very badly hurt".

The full extent of the damage is still to be seen, he adds.

The UN's secretary-general takes the floor first in New York, calling the US strikes on Iran's nuclear facilities "a perilous turn in a region already reeling".

Anotnio Guterres says he condemns any military escalation in the Middle East.

"The people of the region cannot endure another cycle of destruction, and yet we now risk descending into a rathole of retaliation after retaliation," he says. 

He adds: "The United Nations stands ready to support any and all efforts toward the peaceful resolution. But peace cannot be imposed. It must be chosen."

The United Nations Security Council is convening for an emergency meeting in New York.

The meeting was called by Iran after the US joined the Israel-Iran conflict last night by launching strikes on three Iranian nuclear sites.

You can watch the meeting at the top of this page. We'll also be providing live text updates here in the blog.

The Israeli air force says it's currently striking military infrastructure sites in Tehran and western Iran.

Earlier today, the military said its jets had carried out a "wide" operation against sites related to Iran's ballistic missile apparatus.

It claimed to have struck a target in the Yazd area of central Iran, adding it was the "furthest target we've struck to date" (see 16.30 post).

The UN Security Council is holding an emergency meeting today to discuss the Israel-Iran conflict and yesterday's US intervention.

Speaking in New York, Israel's ambassador to the UN says Iran will be hit with an "overpowering righteous force" if it continues to launch strikes against Israeli civilians.

He says he "prays that there will be change for the people of Iran", but that it must come from inside, not from Israel.

On the US strikes, Danny Danon says it's "too early to assess the attack". 

Donald Trump's former national security adviser has told Sky News that the US president made the right decision to strike Iran's nuclear facilities, urging him to now go further.

John Bolton, whom Trump fired in 2019 after a short stint as his adviser, told lead world news presenter Yalda Hakim that the strikes were "the right thing to do".

"It was a decisive action. It was the right thing to do. I thought somebody should do it for a long time, and it's better late than never."

This afternoon, vice president JD Vance told NBC News that the US is "not at war with Iran" and is instead at war with its nuclear programme.

But Bolton says the US should learn its lesson from Iraq, where he says Saddam Hussein kept together 3,000 nuclear scientists and technicians who could rebuild the Iraqi nuclear programme despite its infrastructure being destroyed.

"You can't eliminate the knowledge that the Iranian scientist had," Bolton says, adding that the "Iranian regime has to be overthrown".