War and Talks Don’t Go Together: Iran’s Foreign Minister

On his official Twitter page on Monday, Zarif posted a video showing a “little boy whose heartbroken mother can’t get him prosthetic legs as he grows” and emphasized that innocent civilians are being targeted by sanctions and economic terrorism applied to Iran by the United States.

“This is @realDonaldTrump’s ‘economic war’. And war and talks—with or without preconditions—don’t go together,” the top Iranian diplomat pointed out.

Zarif’s post came a day after US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Washington is keen to hold negotiations with Iran “with no preconditions” amid the intensification of tensions between the two countries.

Addressing a news conference in Switzerland earlier in the day, the US secretary of state said, “We are prepared to engage in a conversation with no preconditions. We are ready to sit down with them.”

In reaction to Pompeo’s statements, Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Abbas Moussavi said a game of words by the United States is not important to Iran, but the Islamic Republic expects a change in Washington’s general approach to the Iranian nation.

“For the Islamic Republic of Iran, a game of words and expressing covert goals under the guise of new words is not a criterion for action, but a change in the United States’ general approach and practical stance toward the Iranian nation is the criterion,” he said.