President Donald Trump said on March 14 that Iran is willing to negotiate a cease-fire but he doesn’t like the terms offered.
“Iran wants to make a deal, and I don’t want to make it because the terms aren’t good enough yet,” Trump told NBC News in a phone interview.
Trump did not say what specifically needed to be included in the deal to end the war, but he said that Iran would need to completely abandon any nuclear ambitions.
Iranian Foreign Minister Seyed Abbas Araghchi denied that Iran had pushed for a cease-fire.
“No, we never asked for a cease-fire, and we have never asked even for negotiation,” Araghchi said during a March 15 interview on “Face The Nation.”
Araghchi said Iran was ready to defend itself for as long as it takes.
“It’s not a war of survival,” Araghchi added. “We are, we are, you know, stable and strong enough. We are only defending our people from, you know, this act of aggression and we don’t see any reason why we should talk with Americans, because we were talking with them when they decided to attack us.”
In his phone call with NBC, Trump suggested the younger Khamenei may no longer be alive.
“I don’t know if he’s even alive,” he said. “So far, nobody’s been able to show him.”
“I’m hearing he’s not alive, and if he is, he should do something very smart for his country, and that’s surrender,” he added.
U.S. forces did not strike the oil infrastructure on the island, which would have crippled Iran’s economy.
