Get the latest news and updates from Dawn
IRAN wants an end to hostilities on all fronts and a simultaneous lifting of the blockade in the Strait of Hormuz before negotiations with the US can begin. However, this is a sticking point not only for the US but also for Israel, which insists that any preliminary dialogue without the nuclear issue as the centrepiece would be a nonstarter.
A senior Iranian official, not wishing to be named, explained what was keeping Tehran from negotiations. He said that after last year’s attacks, President Donald Trump claimed that all Iranian nuclear sites had been “obliterated”. “If that is true,” the official argued, “then the priority should be ending the war rather than negotiating over enrichment, which is no longer a threat.” Iran points out that it remains a signatory to the nuclear non-proliferation treaty (NPT), under which the IAEA has conducted 15 inspections through its safeguards system. Meanwhile, Trump’s administration wants zero uranium enrichment, insisting Tehran abandon all enrichment activities, even for civilian purposes, and halt its nuclear programme entirely to secure a deal. A recent report by Iran’s semi-official Fars news agency claimed Washington demanded Iran keep only one nuclear site operational and transfer the rest of its highly enriched uranium stockpile to the US.
