US to hold nuclear talks with Iran next week

U.S. President Donald Trump said on Wednesday that he would likely seek a commitment from Iran to end its nuclear ambitions during talks scheduled for next week, as he credited recent U.S. airstrikes with helping bring a swift end to the conflict between Israel and Iran.

Trump said Sunday’s deployment of massive bunker-busting bombs had severely damaged Iran’s nuclear infrastructure, calling the results “a victory for everybody”.

“It was very severe. It was obliteration,” Trump said, downplaying an initial U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency assessment that Iran’s nuclear program may have only been delayed by a few months.

As a fragile ceasefire took hold Tuesday, residents in both Iran and Israel began cautiously returning to normal life, following 12 days of intense confrontation—the worst ever between the two countries.

Speaking from The Hague during a NATO summit, Trump expressed confidence that Iran would no longer pursue nuclear weapons development, despite Tehran’s longstanding denials that it seeks such arms.

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“We’re going to talk to them next week. We may sign an agreement. I don’t know. To me, I don’t think it’s even necessary,” Trump said. “The last thing they want to do is enrich anything right now. They want to recover,” he added, referring to Western accusations that Iran has enriched uranium close to weapons-grade levels.

Later in the day, CIA Director John Ratcliffe issued a statement confirming that the airstrikes had “severely damaged” Iran’s nuclear capabilities. While he stopped short of declaring the program destroyed, he said credible evidence showed that several key Iranian facilities were demolished and could take years to rebuild.

Israel’s nuclear agency similarly assessed that the strikes had set back Iran’s nuclear ambitions by many years. Although the White House circulated this assessment, Trump said he was not relying solely on Israeli intelligence.

The president said he believed Iran would opt for diplomacy and suggested future relations might be possible. He offered no specifics on the upcoming discussions, including the location or participants.

“If they try to rebuild their nuclear program, we won’t let that happen—militarily, we won’t,” Trump said. “But I think we’ll end up with some kind of relationship with Iran to resolve this.”

However, independent reports have claimed that the impact of bombing the three Iranian nuclear facilities by the Trump-led US government can only delay the programme for months, but not permanently stop the Iranian regime.

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