Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has criticised the United States proposal for a new nuclear agreement, reiterating that it will not stop enriching uranium.
Iranian negotiators are set to respond in the coming days to what the White House called a “detailed and acceptable” plan presented at talks last Saturday.
United States reports say it proposes that Iran halt all production of enriched uranium, which can be used to make reactor fuel but also nuclear weapons and instead rely on a regional consortium for supplies.
As supreme leader, Khamenei has final say on the country’s most important issues, including a potential nuclear deal. In a speech marking the anniversary of the death of the Islamic Republic’s founder, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, he said that was “100 per cent against the idea of ‘We can’, a famous slogan of Khomeini.
“Uranium enrichment is the key to our nuclear programme and the enemies have focused on the enrichment,” he added.
“The rude and arrogant leaders of America repeatedly demand that we should not have a nuclear programme. Who are you to decide whether Iran should have enrichment?”
Khamenei was speaking days after United States President Donald Trump insisted that Iran would have to halt uranium enrichment. Trump has warned Iran that it could face United State and Israeli military action if the negotiations are not successful.
Under a 2015 deal with six world powers, Iran agreed to limit its nuclear activities in return for sanctions relief. That included not enriching uranium above 3.67 per cent purity, which can be used to produce fuel for commercial nuclear power plants.
Trump abandoned the agreement during his first term in 2018, saying it did too little to stop a pathway to a bomb, and reinstated crippling economic sanctions to force Iran to renegotiate.
Iran insists its nuclear activities are entirely peaceful and that it will never seek to develop or acquire nuclear weapons.
However, it has increasingly breached restrictions of the existing nuclear deal in retaliation for the sanctions.
A report from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said last week that it had now stockpiled more than 408kg (900lb) of uranium enriched to 60 per cent purity, near weapons grade, which would be enough to make nine nuclear bombs.
