Iranians walk out of Swiss talks venue after Trump threat to ‘hit Iran very hard again’
‘They would do better to be careful,’ said Iran’s chief negotiator Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf of Trump’s comment. ‘We are the ones who act’
Iran’s delegation on Sunday walked out of the Swiss venue where it held talks with the United States towards permanently ending the Middle East war, after Donald Trump threatened to strike the Islamic republic over its support for Hezbollah.
The negotiations to end a war that sowed chaos across the region and rattled the global economy are meant to trigger a 60-day period to settle broader issues that have dogged US-Iranian relations for decades.
But disagreement over key sticking points and the threat of renewed fighting in Lebanon weighed on the talks, with Washington and Tehran exchanging threats in parallel with the negotiations.
“The delegation of the Islamic Republic of Iran, after meeting with the Qatari delegation as one of the mediating parties, left the building where the negotiations were being held,” Iran’s state news agency IRNA said.
“At the same time as the talks began in Switzerland, Donald Trump published a message on X in which he repeated his threats and remarks against Iran,” it said.
A diplomat with knowledge of the talks, however, told Agence France-Presse that the Iranians had not quit the negotiations.