Echoing Israel, US hints at force if Iran diplomacy fails
US President Joe Biden's administration hinted Wednesday it could resort to force if diplomacy fails on Iran's nuclear program, rallying more closely than ever behind warnings by Israel.
Amid a standstill in negotiations with Iran, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken voiced growing frustration as he held three-way talks with the top diplomats of Israel and the United Arab Emirates, US allies that established relations last year amid shared alarm about Tehran.
Blinken renewed Biden's offer to re-enter a 2015 nuclear agreement, trashed by former president Donald Trump, in which Iran drastically scaled back nuclear activity in return for unfulfilled promises of sanctions relief.
"We continue to believe that diplomacy is the most effective way," Blinken told a joint news conference.
"But it takes two to engage in diplomacy and we have not seen from Iran a willingness to do that at this point," he said.
"We are prepared to turn to other options if Iran doesn't change course," he warned.
He did not elaborate, but Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid, without being contradicted, said of Blinken's comments: "I think everybody understands -- here in Israel and in the Emirates and in Tehran -- what it is that we mean."
"If a terror regime is going to acquire a nuclear weapon, we must act. We must make clear the civilized world won't allow it," Lapid said.
Enrique Mora, the EU envoy in charge of reviving the troubled deal, visited Tehran yesterday. He met Iranian deputy foreign minister Ali Bagheri in Tehran, the Iranian ministry said.
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