Tehran pushes defiant line on cash, uranium as Vance suggests US and Iran could transform relationship: Our primary option is jihad

Vice President JD Vance floated the possibility Sunday that the US and Iran could “transform” their relationship through the negotiations in Switzerland— but officials in Tehran made clear they were not there to make friends, and instead were trying to use the negotiations to pry billions out of the US and its allies.Iran’s president said Sunday that the Islamic Republic will not give up its right to enriched uranium as part of the peace deal with the US — whiling noting that a deal could save the country’s economy by unlocking sanctioned cash.Meanwhile, the Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei’s main representative to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps suggested that Iran would participate in the negotiations, but were not worried if they failed.

“Our primary option is jihad, whether on the battlefield or in the streets.We are not worried about the negotiations failing.

We have not gone into negotiations out of desperation or helplessness,” Abdollah Haji Sadeghi told Al-Jazeera.As far as the fate of Iran’s nuclear material, President Masoud Pezeshkian said his nation was willing to provide assurances, yet again, that Iran would not develop nuclear weapons.But, he said that enriched uranium is still needed to develop power plants in the country.“What the United States demands is that Iran not build an atomic bomb.

This is nothing new, and we can also state in writing that we have no intention of building a bomb,” Pezeshkian said in a statement.“However, we will not relinquish our right to enrichment, and the other side will have no choice but to accept this right,” he added.

Iran currently possesses nearly 1,000 pounds of highly enriched uranium, which is believed to be buried underground following joint US-Israeli airstrikes last year.The atomic material, enriched at 60%, would only be a few technical steps from reaching the 90% enrichment point for weapons-grade uranium.

Iran has long denied claims that it would use the uranium to de...