Seven civilians were killed in early morning airstrikes on north-western Iran, state media reported on Wednesday, as the leadership continues to deny that it is in talks with the Trump administration over an end to the war launched by Israel and the US.<\/p>\n
Staff accommodation for railway workers in the city of Tabriz was targeted by Israeli-US attacks early on Wednesday, the Tasnim news agency reported.<\/p>\n
Seven died and volunteers were searching through the rubble for further possible victims, the report said.<\/p>\n
As attacks on Iran and retaliatory strikes in the region continue, Iran’s military leadership rejected US reports that negotiations were taking place on an end to the conflict.<\/p>\n
“Your [own] conflicts have reached the stage where you are negotiating with yourselves,” said the spokesman for the Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters, which coordinates the operational command of the Iranian armed forces in wartime.<\/p>\n
US media reports said that the US had presented a 15-point plan to end the war with Iran, with Pakistan acting as an intermediary to deliver the proposal to Tehran.<\/p>\n
Trump has repeatedly said this week that the US is in negotiations with Iran and that Tehran is eager to reach an agreement to end the hostilities, a claim that Iran has consistently denied.<\/p>\n
Pakistan on Tuesday offered to host potential talks between the two sides that could reportedly take place later this week.<\/p>\n
According to Israeli broadcaster N12, the draft includes commitments from Iran not to pursue nuclear weapons and to hand over its stockpile of enriched uranium to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).<\/p>\n
US news outlet Axios, citing a source with knowledge of the matter, reported that US special envoy Steve Witkoff told President Donald Trump that Iran had agreed on several key points, including giving up its stockpile of highly enriched uranium.<\/p>\n
However, it remained unclear how Tehran would formally respond to the proposal, the New York Times reported. The reaction of Israel, another party to the conflict, was also uncertain.<\/p>\n
The military spokesman on Wednesday stressed that the US must accept that Iran\u2019s armed forces guarantee stability in the region.<\/p>\n
“Hostility towards the Iranian people” must be banished from the “corrupt minds” of the Americans, he said. There would be no compromise with the US government, “neither now nor at any other time,” he added.<\/p>\n
“You will neither be able to invest in the region nor see energy and oil prices return to their previous levels,” the spokesman said, alluding to shocks to the global energy markets triggered by Iran’s decision to effectively block the Strait of Hormuz over the war.<\/p>\n
The narrow waterway between Iran and Oman is a key transit route for global oil and gas supplies, and commercial shipping in the strait has virtually come to a standstill.<\/p>\n
Late on Tuesday, Iran said it was easing restrictions on transit through the Strait of Hormuz, saying vessels not deemed hostile and not supporting military action against Tehran may pass.<\/p>\n
Ships must comply with Iranian security regulations and coordinate their passage with relevant authorities, according to its mission to the United Nations.<\/p>\n
However, Tehran has previously said that ships not linked to the US and Israel are free to pass, meaning it is unclear whether the announcement should be taken as a sign of rapprochement amid Trump’s claims of talks.<\/p>\n
Israeli and the US began coordinated attacks on Iran on February 28 during negotiations to limit the country’s ability to build a nuclear weapon. Iran has always insisted its nuclear programme is only for peaceful purposes.<\/p>\n
The weeks of strikes have brought widespread destruction and death to the country, still reeling from a brutal government crackdown on protesters early this year.<\/p>\n
Besides effectively closing off the Strait of Hormuz, Iran has responded by launching attacks on Israel as well Gulf countries allied with the US.<\/p>\n
In Kuwait, a fuel depot at the country’s international airport was hit by a drone attack and caught fire, though it was initially unclear whether Iran was responsible.<\/p>\n
The damage was limited and there were no injuries reported so far, the government said on X early on Wednesday.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, the Saudi Defence Ministry said that its air defences intercepted several drones as well as a ballistic missile overnight.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Seven civilians were killed in early morning airstrikes on north-western Iran, state media reported on Wednesday, as the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":35328,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[34,3610,37,269,864,69,15862],"class_list":{"0":"post-35327","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tehran","8":"tag-iran","9":"tag-iranian-armed-forces","10":"tag-israel","11":"tag-nuclear-weapons","12":"tag-president-donald-trump","13":"tag-tehran","14":"tag-the-trump-administration"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@iran\/116289456251948265","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35327","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35327"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35327\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35328"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35327"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35327"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35327"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}