NEW YORK, June 11. /TASS/. US President Donald Trump has said that he does not want an armed conflict with Iran but doubts the possibility of a deal on Tehran’s nuclear program.
"They seem to be delaying, and I think that’s a shame. But I’m less confident now than I would have been a couple of months ago. Something happened to them but I’m much less confident about a deal being made," he told the New York Post's Pod Force One podcast.
"If they don’t make a deal, they’re not going to have a nuclear weapon. If they do make a deal, they’re not going to have a nuclear weapon, too, you know? But they’re not going to have a new nuclear weapon, so it’s not going to matter from that standpoint," Trump noted.
"It would be nicer to do it without warfare, without people dying, it’s so much nicer to do it. But I don’t think I see the same level of enthusiasm for them to make a deal. I think they would make a mistake, but we’ll see. I guess time will tell," the US leader added.
When asked if the US could make Iran stop uranium enrichment, Trump said: "I don’t know. I did think so. And I’m getting more and more less confident.’
The US and Iran held the fifth round of nuclear talks in Rome on May 23. Oman’s Foreign Minister Badr Al Busaidi, who acts as a mediator between the parties, said that "certain but not final progress" had been achieved. The sixth round of talks is expected to take place in Muscat on June 15, the Iranian Foreign Ministry said.
On June 1, the White House said that US Special Presidential Envoy Steve Witkoff had sent a "detailed and acceptable" proposal to the Iranian authorities. According to the Axios news website, the proposal "would allow limited low-level uranium enrichment on Iranian soil for a to-be-determined period of time."
Iranian Defense Minister Aziz Nasirzadeh stated earlier on Wednesday that if an armed conflict with the United States broke out, Iran would attack all US military bases in the Middle East.