‘This whole thing is really about no nuclear—they cannot have a nuclear weapon,’ the U.S. president said.
U.S. President Donald Trump said that the United States will not agree to any deal with Iran unless Tehran abandons its nuclear ambitions, laying down a firm red line ahead of a possible second round of U.S.–Iran peace talks after the first round failed to yield an agreement.
“Well, first of all, if they don’t, we’re not making a deal,” Trump said in an interview with Fox News that aired April 15. “There’s no deal.”
He added that the key objective of U.S. policy regarding Iran remains unchanged.
“This whole thing is really about no nuclear—they cannot have a nuclear weapon,” Trump said.
Trump’s comments come as Washington and Tehran weigh another round of negotiations after talks in Pakistan on April 12 ended without a breakthrough.
In a New York Post interview on April 14, Trump said a second round of talks could take place “over the next two days,” adding that discussions had been moving “a little bit slow.”
He initially suggested a European venue before indicating the talks were more likely to return to Islamabad, where Pakistani officials have been facilitating dialogue.
U.S. Vice President JD Vance, who led the U.S. delegation, said the main obstacle in the first round was Iran’s refusal to commit to abandoning nuclear weapons development.
“Whether we have further conversations, whether we ultimately get to a deal, I really think the ball is in the Iranian court, because we put a lot on the table,” Vance said in an April 13 interview with Fox News.
Iran has maintained that its nuclear ambitions are civilian and peaceful, a position reiterated at an April 14 news briefing by Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson, Esmaeil Baqaei.
Baqaei was cited by state-run media IRNA, in a post on Telegram, as saying that Iran has never and will never seek nuclear weapons, dismissing U.S. claims to the contrary as a pretext for hostility.
By Tom Ozimek
