Iran leader says he does not expect results from US talks

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Iran’s supreme leader said he did not expect indirect talks with the US to “yield results”, damping expectations of a breakthrough after President Donald Trump last week suggested negotiations to end the long-running crisis over Tehran’s nuclear programme were making progress.

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s ultimate decision maker, hit back at the US’s insistence that it will not allow the Islamic republic to enrich uranium, underlining the significant gap between the foes.

“The Islamic republic has a certain policy which it will [continue] to pursue,” he said, accusing US officials of making “nonsensical” comments.

He said the previous Iranian administration had also engaged in indirect talks with the US, “which did not achieve any outcome. We do not believe the talks will yield results this time either. We do not know what will happen.”

The comments briefly boosted the global oil price, with Brent crude jumping about 1 per cent before giving up those gains.

Khamenei’s comments came days after US envoy Steve Witkoff on Sunday reiterated that the Trump administration was demanding the full dismantlement of Iran’s nuclear programme.

“We have one very, very clear red line, and that is enrichment. We cannot allow even 1 per cent of an enrichment capability,” said Witkoff, the US’s lead negotiator with Iran, during an interview aired on ABC’s This Week programme.

Iranian analysts say Tehran — which is at its most vulnerable in decades after Israel dealt it and its regional proxies a series of devastating military blows — wants a deal but does not want to be seen to be capitulating to Trump’s pressure.

Iranian officials have repeatedly said that would be unacceptable, with Tehran insisting that it has a right to enrich uranium as a signatory to the non-proliferation treaty.

Iran’s foreign minister Abbas Araghchi said on Tuesday that Iran’s ability to enrich was “not negotiable”, while dismissing the “totally unreasonable positions publicly revealed by the US officials”.

“We will by no means step back from our rights,” Araghchi, who has been negotiating with Witkoff, told state television.

US officials have given mixed signals since the Trump administration first began holding talks with Tehran on the nuclear stand-off in April.

Last week, Trump suggested the negotiations were making headway, saying “we’re getting close to maybe doing a deal”.

“They can’t have a nuclear weapon. That’s the only thing. It’s very simple,” he said.

Trump has insisted he wants an agreement, and Iran and the US have held four rounds of talks since April. But he has also threatened military action if diplomacy fails.

Experts have warned that reaching an agreement between the two foes will be hugely challenging given the level of deep distrust between the parties and the scale of Iran’s nuclear advancements.

The crisis has been simmering since Trump in 2018 unilaterally abandoned the accord Tehran signed with Barack Obama’s administration and other world powers, under which Iran agreed to strict limitations on its nuclear activity in return for sanctions relief.

Tehran responded to Trump’s withdrawal from that deal and his decision to impose hundreds of sanctions on the republic by dramatically increasing its enrichment process.

For several years, it has been enriching uranium up to 60 per cent purity, which is close to weapons grade, and it has the capacity to produce sufficient fissile material required for several nuclear bombs in a matter of weeks.