Iran steps up military posturing as nuclear talks stall, Israel threatens
Iran's top commanders boasted readiness to respond to potential Israeli strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities amid near-zero progress in the negotiations between Tehran and Washington.
TEHRAN — The fifth round of nuclear talks between Iranian and American negotiators concluded in Rome on Friday without tangible progress, as Iran's military commanders had already intensified their rhetoric, warning of a harsh response to any Israeli strike on Iranian nuclear sites.
Iran's show of readiness comes as talks teeter on the edge of failure, with uranium enrichment emerging as an unbridgeable divide.
"The negotiations are too complex to be resolved in two or three sessions," said Iran's lead negotiator, Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, in an interview with state TV after the Rome meeting. He expressed cautious optimism that upcoming meetings might yield "solutions to make progress possible." Yet his remarks were less than hopeful.
The core sticking point remains Iran's insistence on continuing uranium enrichment, which Tehran sees as its right under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). The United States, however, is demanding a full halt, arguing that any level of enrichment keeps the door open to atomic weaponization.
