Donald Trump has said Iran is “talking to” the US and hinted at a deal to avoid the use of military strikes.
“[Iran is] talking to us, and we’ll see if we can do something, otherwise we’ll see what happens … We have a big fleet heading out there,” he told Fox News. “They are negotiating.”
Trump added that US allies in the region were not being told of plans for possible strikes due to security reasons. He has threatened to intervene in Iran in the wake of a deadly crackdown on anti-government protests.
“Well, we can’t tell them the plan. If I told them the plan, it would be almost as bad as telling you the plan – it could be worse, actually,” he said.
Washington has deployed a naval battle group led by the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier off Iran’s shores, after Trump threatened to intervene in response to a deadly crackdown on anti-government protests.
The arrival of the flotilla has raised fears of a direct confrontation with Iran, which has warned it would respond with missile strikes on US bases, ships and allies – notably Israel – in the event of an attack.
But Trump has said he believes Iran will prefer to make a deal over its nuclear and missile programmes rather than face American military action – and Tehran has said it is ready for nuclear talks if its missiles and defence capabilities are not on the agenda.
“Contrary to the hype of the contrived media war, structural arrangements for negotiations are progressing,” said Ali Larijani, head of Iran’s supreme national security council, a day after the Kremlin said Larijani held talks in Moscow with the Russian president, Vladimir Putin.
Iran’s president, Masoud Pezeshkian, on Saturday said a broader conflict would hurt both Iran and the US.
“The Islamic Republic of Iran has never sought, and in no way seeks, war and it is firmly convinced that a war would be in the interest of neither Iran, nor the United States, nor the region,” he said in a call with his Egyptian counterpart, Abdel Fatah al-Sisi, according to the Iranian presidency.
Iran’s army chief, Amir Hatami, had earlier warned the US and Israel against any attack, saying his forces were “at full defensive and military readiness” to respond.
“If the enemy makes a mistake, without a doubt it will endanger its own security, the security of the region, and the security of the Zionist regime,” Hatami said, according to the official news agency IRNA.
He said Iran’s nuclear technology and expertise “cannot be eliminated”.
With tensions heightened, Iranian authorities rushed to deny that several incidents on Saturday were linked to any attack or sabotage, including an explosion in the southern Iranian port city of Bandar Abbas that local firefighters said was caused by a gas leak.
On Friday, US Central Command said the Revolutionary Guards would conduct “a two-day live-fire naval exercise” in the strait of Hormuz, a key transit hub for global energy supplies.
In a statement, US Central Command warned Iran against “any unsafe and unprofessional behaviour near US forces”.
It drew criticism from Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi.
“Operating off our shores, the US military is now attempting to dictate how our Powerful Armed Forces should conduct target practice in their own turf,” he wrote on X.
The US designated the Revolutionary Guards a terrorist organisation in 2019, a move the European Union followed on Thursday, prompting angry reactions from Tehran.
The US carried out strikes on key Iranian nuclear sites in June when it briefly joined Israel’s 12-day war against its regional foe.
Nationwide protests against the rising cost of living then erupted on 28 December, before turning into a broader anti-government movement that peaked on 8 and 9 January in what authorities called “riots” and blamed on the US and Israel.
The official death toll from the authorities stands at 3,117.
However, the US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency said it had confirmed 6,563 deaths, including 6,170 protesters and 124 children.
On Saturday, Pezeshkian urged his government to heed public grievances after the demonstrations and “serve the people”.
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