Washington ready to enter talks with Tehran “without pre-conditions” – Claims Pompeo

As the US has failed to see any sign of Iran’s giving in to its “maximum pressure” campaign, the American officials are apparently softening their tone regarding the possibility of negotiations with Iran. US State Secretary Mike Pompeo now says Washington is ready to enter talks with Tehran without preconditions.

کد خبر: ۹۰۳۰۷۰

تاریخ: ۱۲ خرداد ۱۳۹۸ - ۲۱:۲۱

Tabnak – As the US has failed to see any sign of Iran’s giving in to its “maximum pressure” campaign, the American officials are apparently softening their tone regarding the possibility of negotiations with Iran. US State Secretary Mike Pompeo now says Washington is ready to enter talks with Tehran without preconditions.

The US is prepared to engage with Iran about its nuclear program without pre-conditions, but needs to see the country behaving like “a normal nation”, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on Sunday.

Iranian president Hassan Rouhani suggested on Saturday that Iran may be willing to hold talks if Washington shows it respect, but said Tehran would not be pressured into talks.

In what The Guardian sees as an “apparent softening of his previous stance”, Pompeo said when asked about Rouhani’s remarks: “We are prepared … to engage in conversations with no pre-conditions, we are ready to sit down.”

However, he claimed Washington would continue to work to “reverse the malign activity” of Iran in the Middle East. Pompeo said Donald Trump had been saying for a long time he was willing to talk to Iran.

Al Jazeera's Rosiland Jordan, reporting from Washington DC, said Pompeo's remarks could not be called a turning point but they showed "the softening of the White House message about Iran".

"There are people in Trump's administration who argue that diplomacy should be the first line of defense," she said.

"Certainly it is significant that Mike Pompeo, who has also been seen as a hardliner on dealing with Iran, would be saying multiple times during the press conference: 'No preconditions, we are ready to talk'."

Pompeo made the remarks on Sunday in Switzerland as political and business leaders from Western nations are gathering for the 67th Bilderberg Meeting, an annual forum in which participants agree not to reveal exactly what was said or who said it.

Recently, Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei ruled out the possibility of negotiations with the United States. Ayatollah Khamenei said talks between Tehran and Washington will be fruitless and harmful.

The Leader warned that sitting down with the US would not result in negotiations, but it is more of a tactic that Americans would use to back their pressure campaign strategy against Iran.

However, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani suggested on Saturday that Iran may be willing to hold talks if the United States showed its respect. Rouhani said Tehran would not be "bullied" into negotiations with Washington, the semi-official Fars news agency reported.

"We are for logic and talks if [the other side] sits respectfully at the negotiating table and follows international regulations, not if it issues an order to negotiate," Rouhani said.

Last year, Pompeo outlined 12 ways Iran must change – including stopping its support for proxy groups and halting its missile program – before the US lifts sanctions.

He also called on Iran to stop uranium enrichment, never to pursue plutonium reprocessing and to close its heavy water reactor. He said it also had to declare all previous military dimensions of its nuclear program and to permanently and verifiably abandon such work.