Iran and the United States prepared for a fifth round of negotiations on the nuclear program that advances quickly from Tehran on Friday in Rome, with an emerging enrichment as the key theme.
American officials to President Donald Trump insist that Iran cannot continue enriching Uranium in any agreement that can see sanctions raised in the economy in Tehran difficulties. Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, on early Friday insisted online that no enrichment would mean “we don’t have an agreement.”
“Discovering the path to an agreement is not space science,” Araghchi wrote on the social platform X. “It’s time to decide.”
The United States will be represented again in the conversations by the envoy of the Middle East Steve Witkoff and Michael Anton, Director of Planning of State Department. The Foreign Minister of Oman, Badr al-Busidi, is mediating the negotiations, since the Sultanate in the Arabian Peninsula has been a confidence interlocutor for Tehran and Washington in the conversations.
A car transported by Araghchi arrived at the Omaní Embassy in the neighborhood of Rome in Camilluccia around 12:30 pm Witkoff had not yet been seen, but the embassy previously served as the site of another round of conversations.
Enrichment remains key in negotiations
The conversations seek to limit Iran’s nuclear program in exchange for the elevation of some of the overwhelming economic sanctions that the United States has imposed on the Islamic Republic, closing in half a century of enmity.
Trump has repeatedly threatened to release air attacks aimed at the Iran program if an agreement is not reached. Iranian officials warn more and more that they could pursue a nuclear weapon with their enriched uranium arsenal to close levels of degree of weapons.
“Iran is almost certain that it is not producing nuclear weapons, but Iran has undertaken activities in recent years that will position it better to produce them, if you decide to do it,” said a new report by the United States Defense Intelligence Agency. “These actions reduce the time required to produce sufficient uranium of degree of weapons for a first nuclear device to probably less than a week.”
However, it is likely that I will still take a work bomb months, experts say.
The enrichment remains the key point of dispute. Witkoff at one time suggested that Iran could enrich the uranium at 3.67%, then then began to say that all Iranian enrichment should stop. That position on the American side has hardened over time.
When asked about the negotiations, the state department spokesman Tammy Bruce said that “we believe we are going to succeed” in the conversations and in Washington’s impulse for not enriching.
“The Iranians are at that table, so they also understand what our position is, and continue to work,” Bruce said Thursday.
An idea floated so far that they could allow Iran to stop enrichment in the Islamic Republic, but maintaining a uranium supply could be a consortium in the Middle East backed by regional countries and the United States there are also multiple countries and the International Atomic Energy Agency that offers an enriched enriched uranium for peaceful purposes by countries.
However, the Iranian Ministry of Foreign Affairs has maintained the enrichment that must continue within the borders of the country and a similar proposal for fuel exchange failed to gain traction in the negotiations in 2010.
Meanwhile, Israel has threatened to attack Iran’s nuclear facilities on his own if he feels threatened, which further complicates tensions in the Middle East already increased by the Israel-Ahamas War in the Gaza Strip.
Araghchi warned Thursday that Iran would take “special measures” to defend their nuclear facilities if Israel continues to threaten them, while warning the United States that would see him as an accomplice of any Israeli attack. The authorities allowed a group of Iranian students to form a human chain on Thursday at their underground enrichment site in Fordo, an area with incredibly adjusted security integrated into a mountain to defend against possible air attacks.
Conversations occur as the United States pressure on Iran increases
However, despite the hard talk of Iran, the Islamic Republic needs an agreement. Its internal policy inflames the mandatory hijab, or handkerchief in the head, and women still ignore the law in the streets of Tehran. Rumors also persist on the government potentially increasing the cost of subsidized gasoline in the country, which has caused national protests in the past.
Iran’s rial currency fell to more than one million to a US dollar in April. The currency has improved with conversations, however, something that Tehran expects will continue as an additional collapse in the Rial could cause more economic disturbances.
Meanwhile, its self -denominated “resistance axis” is found in tingling after Iran’s regional allies in the region have faced repeated attacks by Israel during their war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip. The collapse of the government of Syrian President Bashar Assad during a rebel advance in December also stripped Iran of a key ally.
The Trump administration has also continued to impose new sanctions against Iran, including this week, which saw the United States specifically aim for any sale of sodium perclorato to the Islamic Republic. According to the reports, Iran received that chemist in China’s shipments in his port of Shahid Rajaei near Bandar Abbas. An important and inexplicable explosion killed dozens and wounded more than 1,000 in April during a round of conversations.
Gumbrell reported from Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Associated Press Nasser Karimi writer in Tehran, Iran, contributed to this report.
—Jon Gumbrell and Giada Zampano, Associated Press
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