US President Donald Trump said yesterday he was not seeking war with Tehran after a senior Iranian military commander warned any conflict in the Gulf region could spread uncontrollably and threaten the lives of US troops.
Tensions remain high between longtime foes Iran and the United States after Trump said on Friday that he called off a military strike to retaliate for Iran’s downing of an unmanned US drone out of concern it would have been a disproportionate response.
“I’m not looking for war,” Trump said on NBC’s Meet the Press programme.
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo repeated to reporters yesterday that Washington wanted talks with Tehran.
“We’re prepared to negotiate with no preconditions,” he said. “They know precisely how to find us.
I am confident that at the very moment they’re ready to truly engage with us we’ll be able to begin these conversations.
I’m looking forward to that day.”
Pompeo also said that “significant” sanctions on Iran to be announced today would be aimed at further choking off resources that Tehran uses to fund its activities in the region.
“We are going to deny them the resources they need to do that, thereby keeping American interests and American people safe all around the world,” Pompeo said before leaving to travel for talks on Iran with US allies Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, Tehran’s regional rivals.
Trump has indicated that he would also be prepared to seek a deal to bolster Iran’s flagging economy, an apparent move to defuse tensions.
“I think they want to negotiate. And I think they want to make a deal. And my deal is nuclear. Look, they’re not going to have a nuclear weapon,” Trump said.
Iran played down the impact of any new US sanctions.
They were “just propaganda, as all sanctions...have been imposed and there are no more sanctions left,” state-run news agency IRIB quoted Foreign Ministry spokesman Abbas Mousavi as saying.
Iran denies seeking nuclear weapons and refers to a fatwa or religious decree issued in the early 2000s by Iran’s top authority Ayatollah Ali Khamenei that bans the development or use of nuclear weapons.
Last year Trump withdrew the United States from a 2015 accord between Iran and world powers that curbed Tehran’s nuclear programme in exchange for easing sanctions.
Relations in the region have worsened significantly since then.
Diplomatic efforts are underway to ease tensions following attacks on oil tankers in the Gulf in recent weeks that the United States blames on Iran and the shooting down of the American drone last week.
BRITISH MINISTER ON
DIPLOMATIC MISSION
Andrew Murrison, Britain’s minister for the Middle East and North Africa, said yesterday that he had “open, frank and constructive” talks with Iranian government representatives in Tehran.
“I reiterated the UK’s assessment that Iran almost certainly bears responsibility for recent attacks on tankers in the Gulf of Oman,” and called for such activity to stop, Murrison said. On a visit to Kuwait, the US Special Representative for Iran, Brian Hook, said that the June 28-29 G20 meeting in Osaka, Japan would provide an opportunity to discuss addressing maritime threats in Gulf waters.
“This is a very urgent priority that nations around the world would come together and enhance maritime security...This is one of the most critical shipping lines and we cannot allow Iran to threaten the free flow of commerce, to threaten lives, to threaten maritime catastrophes,” Hook told reporters.
A senior adviser to Khamenei said Iran may scale back compliance with its nuclear deal soon unless European countries shield it from US sanctions through a trade mechanism.
“If Europeans don’t take measures within the 60-day deadline, we will take new steps,” the semi-official ISNA news agency quoted the official, Kamal Kharazi, as saying.
Tehran announced a deadline of 60 days in May. Iran has said it would respond firmly to any threat and warned yesterday of the risks of a military confrontation.
“If a conflict breaks out in the region, no country would be able to manage its scope and timing,” Major General Gholamali Rashid said, according to the semi-official Fars news agency.
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