ISTANBUL (AP) — Iran’s foreign minister announced Friday that his country is ready for dialogue to resolve tensions but that there are no concrete plans for talks with the United States — even as Tehran faces the threat of U.S. military action in response to the killing of peaceful demonstrators and over possible mass executions.
The minister, Abbas Araghchi, spoke in Istanbul where he arrived earlier in the day for talks with Turkish officials. Ankara
has been working to reduce tensions in the wider region following threats of a possible U.S. military strike against Iran.
Iran has cracked down on nationwide protests, which began as demonstrations against the country's economic woes but broadened into a challenge to the Islamic Republic's theocracy. Activists say the crackdown has killed at least 6,479 people.
The U.S. military has moved the USS Abraham Lincoln and several guided-missile destroyers into the Middle Eeast but it remains unclear whether President Donald Trump will decide to use force.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan offered during a telephone call with Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian earlier on Friday to act as a “facilitator” between Iran and the U.S., according to his office.
Araghchi told reporters during a joint news conference with Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan that Iran has no plans to "meet with the Americans.”
“We are ready for fair and equitable negotiations,” he said. "For such negotiations, arrangements must first be made, both regarding the form of the talks and the location of the talks, and about the topic of the talks.”
"The Islamic Republic of Iran, just as it is ready for negotiations, it is also ready for war,” Araghchi added.
Turkey opposes a military intervention against Iran, warning such an action would lead to regional instability.
“We are against resorting to military options to solve problems, and we do not believe that this will be very effective," Fidan said. "We advocate for negotiation and diplomacy.”
Araghchi’s visit came a day after the European United agreed to list Iran's paramilitary Revolutionary Guard as a “terrorist organization” over Tehran’s bloody crackdown on protesters.
Araghchi on Wednesday posted on X that Iran's military is prepared “with their fingers on the trigger” to respond to any attack, whether by land, air and sea.
He later, in another post on X, indirectly criticized the EU move against the Guard, saying that “several countries are presently attempting to avert the eruption of all-out war in our region. None of them are European.”
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Associated Press writer Suzan Fraser in Ankara, Turkey, contributed to this report.
