US to Hold Direct Talks With Iran on Saturday: Trump

President Donald Trump said on April 7 that the United States will be holding direct high-level talks with Iran.

The talks will be held on April 12, the president said during his meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the White House.

“I think everybody agrees that doing a deal would be preferable to doing the obvious,” Trump said in an apparent reference to possible military action against Iran.

“And the obvious is not something that I want to be involved with or, frankly, that Israel wants to be involved with if they can avoid it,” he said. “So we’re going to see if we can avoid it.”

“Maybe a deal’s going to be made.”

Trump did not say where the “very big meeting” will be held and who might be at the negotiating table. He said that talks with Iran will be “at very senior levels,” though he did not name anyone specific.

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The U.S. president said that Iran cannot be allowed to have a nuclear weapon. He warned that “it will be a very bad day for Iran” if they don’t agree to a deal.

Iran has previously rejected direct talks with the United States, saying they would be “meaningless.”

“If you want negotiations, then what is the point of threatening?” said the country’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, on April 6.

After Trump sent Iran a letter last month requesting direct talks, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian on March 30 said: “Although the possibility of direct negotiations between the two sides has been rejected in this response, it has been emphasized that the path for indirect negotiations remains open.”

In 2018, during his first term, Trump withdrew from the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), and reimposed sanctions lifted under it in addition to enacting fresh sanctions on the regime. Critics of the accord said that it did not stop Iran from developing nuclear weapons and that it did not address Iran’s support for terrorism and other malign activities.

Netanyahu objected to the 2015 agreement, warning Congress about it. President Barack Obama and his administration boycotted his visit to the United States.

At the White House, in addition to discussing the Iranian threat, Trump and Netanyahu discussed trade between the United States and Israel.

Last week, the United States imposed a 17 percent tariff on Israel, among other reciprocal tariffs on almost 90 other countries.

“We will eliminate the trade deficit with the United States,” Netanyahu said on April 7. “We intend to do it very quickly. We think it’s the right thing to do, and we’re going to also eliminate trade barriers, a variety of trade barriers that have been put up unnecessarily.