Donald Trump reported that he had written a letter to Iran’s leaders, calling on the nation to sit down and negotiate a new nuclear agreement.
Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Saturday criticized what he called bullying tactics a day after US President Donald Trump threatened military action against Iran.
Certain bully governments — I don’t know what else to call certain foreign leaders and figures than the term bullying — are insisting on talks. Their talks are not for finding solutions, they’re for domination,” AFP quoted Khamenei as telling a meeting of country’s officials.
The Iranian leader’s statement is hours after Tehran’s UN mission reported that it did not receive any letter from Trump. We have not received such a letter yet,” an embassy spokesman for Iran to the UN said after Tehran’s foreign minister informed AFP Friday that the nation would not negotiate as long as the United States imposes “maximum pressure.”
Trump told Fox’s Maria Bartiromo in an interview on Friday that he had written a letter to Iran’s leadership, encouraging the nation to enter into a new nuclear agreement. “I’ve written them a letter saying I hope you negotiate because if we have to go in militarily, it’s going to be a terrible thing for them,” Trump said.
Trump added that although he isn’t excluding the possibility of a military intervention, he would “rather negotiate a deal.” I don’t know if everyone will agree with me, but we can negotiate an agreement that would be just as good as if you had won militarily,” the US president said.
Later Friday in the Oval Office, Trump declared the Iran situation “down to final strokes” and intimated a deadline for a deal or military action was nearing quickly. We have an Iran situation where something’s going to happen very soon,” Bloomberg reported Trump as saying. Happily we can have a peace agreement. I’m not talking out of strength or weakness. I’m simply saying I’d prefer to see a peace agreement,” he said.
