 "'Not acceptable': Trump on Iran's counter-proposal as it rejects key US demand")
US President Donald Trump has rejected the Iranian counter-proposal in ongoing nuclear talks and called it “unacceptable”.
The Trump administration and Iran are at loggerheads on the issue of uranium enrichment. While Iran wants to continue enriching nuclear fuel for civilian purposes, the United States has maintained that Iran should have no enrichment capacities.
The Trump administration and Iran have held five rounds of talks so far. They are negotiating a nuclear deal, seven years after Trump withdrew from the Iran nuclear deal of 2015 , and a reset of the bilateral relationship. The talks come at a time when Iran has ramped up the development of near-weapons grade uranium and has reduced the time needed to develop a nuclear weapon once the go-ahead comes from Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei.
Trump rejects Iranian counter-proposal
Without going into the specifics, Trump on Monday said that the counter-proposal was “unacceptable” and warned that the failure to reach a deal would mean death and destruction for Iran.
“They don’t want to give up what they have to give up. You know what that is? They seek enrichment. We can’t have enrichment. We want just the opposite. And so far, they’re not there. I hate to say that, because the alternative is a very, very dire one, but they’re not there. They have given us their thoughts on the deal, and I said, you know, it’s just not acceptable,” said Trump.
The counter-proposal was submitted in response to a ‘bridge proposal’ floated by US Middle East Envoy Steve Witkoff.
Trump said that he has warned Khamenei that a deal is a must to ensure that “there is no destruction and death”.
The principal US ally in West Asia, Israel, has long considered an Iranian nuclear weapon an existential threat. Israel has made it clear that it will not allow Iran to develop a nuclear weapon and will destroy Iranian nuclear programme even by itself. Amid ongoing US-Iran talks, Trump has asked Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to not take any military action regarding Iranian nuclear capabilities.
Trump warns Iran of death & destruction
Even as Trump has sounded confident of reaching a deal in recent days, he said in his latest remarks that “it might not work out that way” for sure.
“We’re trying to make a deal so that there’s no destruction and death. And we’ve told them that, and I’ve told them that, and I hope that’s the way it works out, but it might not work out that way,” said Trump.
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Under Witkoff’s bridge proposal, Iran could enrich uranium up to 3-5 per cent level that is required for civilian purposes until the United States would set up a consortium of regional countries to provide Iran with such nuclear fuel, according to The New York Times.
Under the proposal, a consortium of regional countries would manage the construction of Iran’s nuclear power reactors and supply of nuclear fuel enriched to low levels needed for civilian purposes. Until such an arrangement materialises, Iran could enrich uranium to low levels, but would cease all enrichment once it would start receiving fuel from the consortium.
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