Wednesday Briefing: The U.N. General Assembly Convenes

World leaders gathered in New York to hear President Biden and other speakers address the 79th meeting of the United Nations assembly, in the shadow of war and turmoil across the world.

The wars in Gaza, Ukraine and Sudan are set to dominate the weeklong meeting, though resolutions for the conflicts feel well out of reach. António Guterres, the secretary general of the U.N., warned in his opening remarks that “a powder keg risks engulfing the world.”

In his fourth and final address to the General Assembly, Biden cast his decision to step down from the presidential ticket as a larger lesson for the world’s leaders: “Some things are more important than staying in power.”

Ukraine: The U.N. Security Council convened a session on the war, a last-minute addition after Ukrainian diplomats raised concerns that it might be falling off the agenda with so much attention fixed on the Middle East. President Volodymyr Zelensky is expected to share a new peace proposal and an appeal for more military support to strike deeper into Russia.

Middle East: Biden urged the acceptance of a cease-fire deal in Gaza, saying he put one forward with Qatar and Egypt that has been endorsed by the U.N. Security Council. The U.N. Security Council will meet later today on the escalation in fighting in Lebanon.