Iran’s top leader says negotiation won’t solve problems with US

Tehran: Iran’s Supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has said that the country’s problems with the US will not be solved through negotiation.

Making the remarks while addressing members of Iran’s Basij voluntary force on Saturday, Khamenei explained that only through “holding Iran to ransom permanently” can the United States allow the problems to be solved, since Washington can’t be satisfied and demands a new ransom each time, according to the official news agency IRNA.

The US, under the framework of a 2015 nuclear deal between Tehran and world powers, had agreed to lift the sanctions in return for Iran’s reduction of its nuclear activities. However, America later dropped such commitments, which is another proof that negotiation with Washington is futile, added the Iranian top leader.

The US departure from the nuclear deal, formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, in 2018 and its reimposition of the sanctions on Iran had prompted the latter to reduce some of its nuclear commitments under the deal. In April 2021, the talks on the deal’s revival began in Vienna. No breakthrough was achieved after the latest round of talks in early August, Xinhua News Agency reported.

Speaking of a track record of US insatiable demands, Khamenei said the US firstly asked Iran to stop 20 per cent uranium enrichment, then called for a halt to 5-per cent enrichment, and after that they wanted Tehran to shut down its entire nuclear industry.

Following all these, he noted, they demanded a change in Iran’s constitution and later sought to restrict the country within its borders and close its defence industries.

Khamenei said Washington wants the Iranian nation to cross all its red lines, and no devoted Iranian is willing to let the country be held to ransom in such a way.

Calling for awareness in the face of the enemy, he noted that spreading “fake news and lies” is the “enemy’s most important strategy,” which needs to be confronted through providing accurate and true accounts of the realities on the ground.

Khamenei said the “enemy” seeks to dominate the people’s minds so that a nation will hand over its land to the enemy by its own hand.

He urged the country’s people and officials to remain vigilant and prepared from being caught by surprise when the foe tries to clamour in one place but attack somewhere else.