Iran decries US contradictory statements as ‘unhelpful’ in nuclear talks
Iranian Foreign Ministry’s spokesman Esmaeil Baqaei said contradictory remarks by the US officials over a nuclear deal with Iran are not helpful as the two countries have engaged in new negotiations on Tehran’s nuclear program.
Baqaei made the statement after the US President Donald Trump and his Secretary of State Marco Rubio called for total dismantlement of Iran’s nuclear program while stressing on the path of diplomacy to resolve a decades-long dispute over the issue.
“Such conflicting messages does not affect our determination to stand by our fundamental positions,” Baqaei told reporters in his weekly press conference on Monday.
“If there is sincerity in the claim that the American side’s demand is for the Islamic Republic of Iran not to possess a nuclear bomb, then I believe many issues can be worked out, as we have already declared – and demonstrated in practice – that we are not in any way seeking to weaponize our nuclear program,” the Iranian official said.
Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi also reacted to Trump’s remarks, underscoring the consideration of “mutual respect and mutual interests” as a way to reach an agreement between the two sides.
“If their ultimate goal is, as President Trump has repeatedly said, the only thing they can’t have is nuclear weapons, an agreement is achievable, but there is only one way to achieve it: diplomacy, based on mutual respect and mutual interests”, Araghchi said on X.
Trump said on Sunday that his goal in discussions with Iran is “total dismantlement” of that nation’s nuclear program.
He also said that he is willing to listen to arguments for allowing Iran to pursue civilian nuclear energy while ending what he called its nuclear weapons program.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has also called on Iran to “walk away” from uranium enrichment. In a Thursday interview with Fox News Rubio claimed that “the only countries in the world that enrich uranium are the ones that have nuclear weapons.”
Iran’s top diplomat hit back at Rubio’s remarks, saying that, “Iran has every right to possess the full nuclear fuel cycle,” citing Tehran’s long-standing membership of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).
Iran and the United States have held three rounds of nuclear talks since April 12, their highest-level contact since Washington withdrew from a landmark deal with Tehran in 2018, during Trump’s first term as US president.
However, the fourth round of talks initially scheduled for Saturday was postponed due to “logistical reasons.”
Baqaei said that Tehran was flexible regarding the timing of talks and was waiting for details from mediator Oman regarding the next round of negotiations with the US.
The US and other Western countries have long accused Iran of pursuing nuclear weapons – a claim Tehran denies, insisting that its atomic program is solely for civilian purposes.