Iran rejects Trump's claims it asked for relaunch of nuke talks

Tehran [Iran], July 9: Iran says it has not requested talks with the United States over its nuclear programme, as claimed by US President Donald Trump.
"No request for a meeting has been made on our side to the American side," Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei said on Tuesday in comments carried by the country's Tasnim news agency.
The clarification came a day after Trump, during a dinner in the White House with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, said Iran was actively seeking negotiations on a new nuclear deal following the 12-day war with Israel last month, which the US also joined.
"We have scheduled Iran talks. They want to talk," Trump told reporters. "They want to work something out. They are very different now than they were two weeks ago."
Trump's Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff - also present during the dinner - had even said the meeting could take place in the next week or so.
Iran's Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi wrote in an opinion piece published in the Financial Times newspaper on Tuesday that Tehran remains interested in diplomacy but "we have good reason to have doubts about further dialogue".
On June 13, Israel launched an unprecedented bombing campaign on Iran that targeted military and nuclear sites as well as residential areas, killing senior military commanders and nuclear scientists. Iranian authorities say the Israeli strikes killed at least 1,060 people. Israel says retaliatory drone and missile fire by Iran killed at least 28 people.
Source: Qatar Tribune