Iran\u2019s supreme leader vowed on Thursday that his country would ramp up development of its civilian nuclear program, as major world powers continued delicate talks in Vienna to revive Tehran\u2019s landmark nuclear deal.
In a televised speech, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei urged the importance of nuclear energy for Iran, while again asserting that it had no interest in nuclear weapons.
Khamenei\u2019s remarks seemed clearly aimed at the countries involved in the Vienna talks.
\u201cEnemies are making cruel moves against our nuclear energy issue, (putting) sanctions on nuclear energy that they know is peaceful,\u201d he said. \u201cThey do not want Iran to achieve this great and significant progress.\u201d
The accord, which former President Donald Trump abandoned nearly four years ago, granted Iran sanctions relief in exchange for curbs on its atomic program. Iran\u2019s chief nuclear negotiator, Ali Bagheri Kani, tweeted late Wednesday that the parties were \u201ccloser than ever\u201d to an agreement.
But talks have repeatedly stalled in recent months as Iranian negotiators press hard-line demands, exasperating Western diplomats.
Khamenei, who so far has largely stayed silent on the ongoing negotiations, called claims that Iran was pursuing a bomb \u201cnonsense,\u201d saying they were meant to deprive Iran of its legitimate right to nuclear power.
\u201cIf we do not pursue (peaceful nuclear energy) today, tomorrow will be late,\u201d he said.
Iran long has insisted its nuclear program is peaceful. But the country\u2019s steps away from its obligations under the 2015 accord have alarmed its archenemy Israel and world powers.
Tehran has since started enriching uranium up to 60% purity \u2014 a short technical step from the 90% needed to make an atomic bomb, and spinning far more advanced centrifuges than those permitted under the deal.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Iran\u2019s supreme leader vowed on Thursday that his country would ramp up development of its civilian nuclear program, as major world powers continued delicate talks in Vienna to revive Tehran\u2019s landmark nuclear deal.In a televised speech, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei urged the importance of nuclear energy for Iran, while again asserting that it had no interest […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":251628,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-251613","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/251613","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=251613"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/251613\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/251628"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=251613"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=251613"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=251613"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}