DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — U.S. President Donald Trump said on Friday that he expects Iran to open itself to international inspection to verify that it doesn’t restart its nuclear program.
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Asked during a White House news conference if he would demand during expected talks with Iran that the International Atomic Energy Agency, the U.N. nuclear watchdog, or some other organization be authorized to conduct inspections, Trump responded that the Islamic Republic would have to cooperate with the group “or somebody that we respect, including ourselves.”
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Earlier, Iran’s top diplomat said that the possibility of new negotiations with the United States on his country’s nuclear program has been “complicated” by the American attack on three of the sites, which he conceded caused “serious damage.”
The U.S. was one of the parties to the 2015 nuclear deal in which Iran agreed to limits on its uranium enrichment program in exchange for sanctions relief and other benefits.
Nuclear talks
That deal unraveled after Trump unilaterally pulled out the U.S. during his first term. Trump has suggested he’s interested in new talks with Iran and said the two sides would meet next week.
In an interview on Iranian state television broadcast late Thursday, Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi left open the possibility that his country would again enter talks on its nuclear program, but suggested it wouldn’t be anytime soon.
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“No agreement has been made for resuming the negotiations,” he said. “No time has been set, no promise has been made, and we haven’t even talked about restarting the talks.”
The American decision to intervene militarily “made it more complicated and more difficult” for talks on Iran’s nuclear program, Araghchi said.
Friday prayers
Many imams, during Friday prayers, stressed Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s message from Thursday that the war had been a victory for Iran.
Cleric Hamzeh Khalili, who is also the deputy chief justice of Iran, vowed during a prayer service in Tehran that the courts would prosecute people accused of spying for Israel “in a special way.”
During the war with Israel, Iran hanged several people whom it already had in custody on espionage charges, sparking fears from activists that it could conduct a wave of executions after the conflict ended. Authorities reportedly have detained dozens in various cities on the charge of cooperating with Israel.
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Israel relentlessly attacked Iran beginning on June 13, targeting its nuclear sites, defense systems, high-ranking military officials and atomic scientists.
In 12 days of strikes, Israel said that it killed around 30 Iranian commanders and 11 nuclear scientists, while hitting eight nuclear-related facilities and more than 720 military infrastructure sites. More than 1,000 people were killed, including at least 417 civilians, according to the Washington-based Human Rights Activists group.
Iran fired more than 550 ballistic missiles at Israel, most of which were intercepted, but those that got through caused damage in many areas and killed 28 people.
Israeli military spokesperson Brig. Gen Effie Defrin said Friday that in some areas, it had exceeded its operational goals, but needed to remain vigilant.
“We are under no illusion, the enemy has not changed its intentions,” he said.
The U.S. stepped in on Sunday to hit three of Iran’s nuclear sites with bunker busters dropped by B-2 bombers — explosives designed to penetrate deep into the ground to damage the heavily fortified targets. Iran, in retaliation, fired missiles at a U.S. base in Qatar on Monday, but caused no known casualties.
Trump and Khamenei claims
Trump said that the American attacks “completely and fully obliterated” Iran’s nuclear program. However, Khamenei on Thursday accused the U.S. president of exaggerating the damage, saying the strikes didn’t “achieve anything significant.”
In response, Trump told reporters Friday that the sites were “bombed to hell.” He even directed a message to the supreme leader: “Look you’re a man of great faith. A man who’s highly respected in his country. You have to tell the truth. You got beat to hell.”
A senior Israeli military official said Friday that their intelligence shows that Israel’s strikes on various targets neutralized Iran’s ability to enrich uranium to 90% for “a prolonged period.” It was unclear whether that contradicted a preliminary U.S. report that suggested the program had been set back months.
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There has been speculation that Iran moved much of its highly-enriched uranium before the strikes, something that it told the IAEA that it planned to do.
Even if that turns out to be true, IAEA Director-General Rafael Mariano Grossi told Radio France International that the damage done to the Fordo site, which was built into a mountain, “is very, very, very considerable.”
Among other things, he said, centrifuges are “quite precise machines,” and it’s “not possible” that the concussion from multiple 30,000-pound bombs wouldn’t have caused “important physical damage.”
“These centrifuges are no longer operational,” he said.
Araghchi himself acknowledged “the level of damage is high, and it’s serious damage.”
He added that Iran hadn’t yet decided whether to allow in IAEA inspectors to assess the damage, but they would be kept out “for the time being.”
Aamer Madhani in Washington. and Julia Frankel and Sam Mednick in Jerusalem, contributed to this story.
