Nuclear Weapons

Head of nuclear watchdog warns Israeli strike may harden Iran’s resolve on nuclear arms as diplomacy stalls.

The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Rafael Grossi, has warned that an Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities could push Tehran closer to developing nuclear weapons as indirect talks between the United States and Iran continue through Omani mediation.

Speaking to i24 News and The Jerusalem Post, Grossi said Iranian officials had cautioned him about the potential consequences of a strike.

“A strike could potentially have an amalgamating effect, solidifying Iran’s determination – I will say it plainly – to pursue a nuclear weapon or withdraw from the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons,” he said in an interview that was published on Monday.

Grossi added that he did not believe Israel would launch such an operation.

“But one thing is certain,” he said, “The [Iranian] programme runs wide and deep. And when I say ‘deep’, I mean it. Many of these facilities are extremely well-protected. Disrupting them would require overwhelming and devastating force.”

He made his comments as Iran prepares a counteroffer to a US proposal for a new nuclear deal.

Iranian Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei said on Monday that the US offer lacked key elements and failed to address sanctions relief – a longstanding demand from Tehran.

“We will soon submit our own proposed plan to the other side through Oman once it is finalised,” Baghaei said without elaborating on the details.

He also criticised the IAEA’s latest report on Iran’s nuclear programme as “unbalanced”, accusing it of relying on “forged documents” from Israel. The IAEA had recently described Iran’s cooperation as “less than satisfactory”, particularly in clarifying past nuclear activities at undeclared locations.

The US and Iran are trying to strike a new nuclear deal after a 2015 agreement was abandoned by US President Donald Trump in 2018 during his first term.

In a surprise comment last week, Trump said he had warned Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu not to jeopardise the fragile negotiations.

“I told him this would be inappropriate to do right now because we’re very close to a solution,” Trump said.

It remains unclear when the next round of indirect negotiations will take place. Baghaei said talks are ongoing but did not give a date for the next meeting

Tehran indicates it will not accept the US proposal made during the fifth round of talks last month.

Iran will soon present a counterproposal for a nuclear deal to the United States, according to its Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Esmaeil Baghaei, the ministry’s spokesman, told a weekly news conference on Monday that Iran was not satisfied with a US proposal and it would present its version via mediator Oman.

This marks the first public sign that Tehran will not accept the US proposal after the fifth round of talks last month, during which Iran said it had received “elements” of a US proposal and Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi later said the text contained “ambiguities”.

Baqhaei criticised the US proposal on Monday as “lacking elements” reflective of the previous rounds of negotiations, but he did not provide details.

“We will soon submit our own proposed plan to the other side through Oman once it is finalised,” he said.

Baghaei said the US proposal failed to include the lifting of sanctions – a key demand for Tehran, which has been reeling under their weight for years.

Five rounds of talks

Tehran and Washington have held talks since April to thrash out a new nuclear accord to replace a deal with major powers that US President Donald Trump abandoned during his first term in 2018.

The longtime foes have been locked in a diplomatic standoff over Iran’s uranium enrichment. Tehran defends it as a “nonnegotiable” right and Washington describes it as a “red line”.

Trump, who has revived his “maximum pressure” campaign of sanctions on Iran since retaking office in January, has repeatedly said Tehran will not be allowed any uranium enrichment under a potential deal.

Last week, Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei dismissed the US proposal as against Iran’s interests, pledging to continue enrichment on Iranian soil, which Western powers view as a potential pathway to building nuclear weapons. Iran says its nuclear programme is only for peaceful purposes.

The United Nations nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), will convene a Board of Governors meeting from Monday to Friday in Vienna to discuss Iran’s nuclear activities.

The meeting comes after the IAEA released a report criticising “less than satisfactory” cooperation from Tehran, particularly in explaining past cases of nuclear material found at undeclared sites.

Iran has criticised the IAEA report as unbalanced, saying it relied on “forged documents” provided by Israel.

It is not yet clear when the sixth round of nuclear talks will take place between Tehran and Washington, Baghaei said.

These are the key events on day 1,199 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Here’s where things stand on Saturday, June 7:

Fighting

• At least six people were killed in Russian missile and drone strikes on the Ukrainian capital Kyiv and across the country on Friday.
• Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said three of the victims were emergency responders who were killed in a missile and drone attack on Kyiv, while a further 80 people nationwide were injured in the attacks.
• Two people were killed in Ukraine’s northern city of Chernihiv, and at least one more person was killed in the northwestern city of Lutsk.
• Ukraine’s air force said Russia had used 407 drones, one of the largest numbers recorded in a single attack, as well as 45 cruise and ballistic missiles in the attack.
• The Ukrainian military said it had launched a preemptive strike overnight on the Engels and Dyagilevo airfields in the Russian regions of Saratov and Ryazan, in addition to striking at least three fuel reservoirs.

• Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said Russia had “responded” to Kyiv’s audacious drone attack that destroyed Russian heavy bombers at airfields in Siberia last weekend by attacking civilians and civilian infrastructure in Ukraine.
• Russia’s Ministry of Defence said its forces had carried out the strikes, which targeted military and military-related targets in response to what it called Ukrainian “terrorist acts” against Russia.
• Western military aviation experts told the Reuters news agency that Russia will take years to replace the nuclear-capable bomber planes that were hit in Ukrainian drone strikes on airfields in Siberia.
• Russia’s National Guard said it killed a man as he tried to prepare a drone attack on a military site in Russia’s Ryazan region, southeast of Moscow.
• Russian air defence units intercepted and destroyed 82 Ukrainian drones over Russian territory, including the Moscow region, Russia’s Defence Ministry said early on Saturday.

• Moscow’s mayor, Sergei Sobyanin, said six drones headed for the capital city had been destroyed or downed.
• In total, Russia’s Defence Ministry said that air defences had downed 174 Ukrainian drones over 13 regions. Three Ukrainian Neptune missiles were also shot down over the Black Sea.
• A locomotive train was derailed in Russia’s Belgorod region after the track was blown up, regional Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said.

Regional security

• German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said some US legislators do not understand the scale of Russia’s military rearmament campaign: “They clearly have no idea what is happening there right now,” he said after a meeting with US President Donald Trump.
• Merz said he had been reassured by President Trump’s “resounding no” to a question on whether the US had plans to withdraw from NATO.

Politics and diplomacy

• The Kremlin reacted angrily to comments by Trump, who likened the war in Ukraine to a bitter dispute between toddlers in a park.
• Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said it was possible Trump believed his own comments, but for Russia, the war on Ukraine was “existential”.
• “For us, it is an existential issue, an issue on our national interest, safety, on our future and the future of our children, of our country,” Peskov told reporters.
• Russia has asked the UN nuclear watchdog to mediate between Moscow and Washington to resolve the question of what to do with US nuclear fuel stored at Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant, which is under Russian control.
• Russian nuclear energy chief Alexei Likhachev said that Russia was willing either to use the fuel, supplied by US company Westinghouse, or to remove it entirely and return it to the United States.

Sanctions

• President Trump said that he had not decided whether to deploy sanctions against Russia that are being considered by the US Senate.

Economy

• The Russian central bank has cut its key interest rate by a full percentage point, a surprise move by the bank, which it justified by pointing to declining inflation pressure and a more robust rouble. It was the first easing since September 2022 by the bank, which has faced pressure from business leaders and top government officials to begin cutting rates.

IAEA head Grossi describes the new government as ‘committed to opening up to the world, to international cooperation’.

Syria’s new government has agreed to give inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) access to suspected former nuclear sites immediately, according to the agency’s chief, as Damascus makes further inroads to rejoining the international fold.

Rafael Grossi, the United Nations’ nuclear watchdog’s director-general, was speaking Wednesday to The Associated Press news agency in Damascus, where he met with President Ahmed al-Sharaa and other officials.

The visit was a key part of the IAEA’s efforts to restore access to sites associated with Syria’s nuclear programme since the ouster of President Bashar al-Assad in December.

The agency’s aim is “to bring total clarity over certain activities that took place in the past that were, in the judgement of the agency, probably related to nuclear weapons”, Grossi said. He described the new government as “committed to opening up to the world, to international cooperation” and said he is hopeful of finishing the inspection process within months.

Grossi’s visit also marks another step towards international acceptance of Syria’s new government after the United States and European Union lifted sanctions on the country last month. Israel has taken an opposite approach to its Western allies, launching more than 200 air, drone or artillery attacks across Syria over the past six months, despite the two countries holding indirect talks in early May.

An IAEA team visited some sites of interest last year. Syria under al-Assad is believed to have operated an extensive clandestine nuclear programme, which included an undeclared nuclear reactor built by North Korea in eastern Deir ez-Zor province.

The IAEA described the reactor as being “not configured to produce electricity” — raising the concern that Damascus sought a nuclear weapon there by producing weapons-grade plutonium.

The reactor site only became public knowledge after Israel, the region’s only nuclear power, launched air strikes in 2007, destroying the facility. Syria later levelled the site and never responded fully to the IAEA’s questions.

Grossi said inspectors plan to return to the reactor in Deir az Zor and three other related sites. Other sites under IAEA safeguards include a miniature neutron source reactor in Damascus and a facility in Homs that can process yellow-cake uranium.

While there are no indications that there have been releases of radiation from the sites, Grossi said, the watchdog is concerned that “enriched uranium can be lying somewhere and could be reused, could be smuggled, could be trafficked”.

He said al-Sharaa had shown a “very positive disposition to talk to us and to allow us to carry out the activities we need to”.

Grossi revealed that the IAEA is also prepared to transfer equipment for nuclear medicine and help rebuild the radiotherapy, nuclear medicine and oncology infrastructure in a health system severely weakened by nearly 14 years of civil war.

“And the president has expressed to me he’s interested in exploring, in the future, nuclear energy as well,” Grossi added.

A number of other countries in the region, including Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt and Jordan, are pursuing nuclear energy in some form.

CHINA has given rare insight into its souped-up DF-5B nuclear missile – a 7,500-mile-range weapon with staggering explosive power.

The missile is said to pack hundreds of times the destructive force of the bombs that devastated Hiroshima and Nagasaki, killing tens of thousands in World War II.

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Although China has long kept its nuke programme secret, state broadcaster CCTV revealed details about the upgraded DF-5B intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) on Monday.

This missile boasts a maximum range of 7,500 miles and an accuracy of 0.3 miles, as per reports by journalist Li Zexin on X.

This range is enough to reach most of Europe and nearly all of the US from launch sites inside China.

For example, the distance from Beijing to London is around 5,000 miles and from China to New York is roughly 7,000 miles.

The DF-5B is said to deliver a yield of three to four megatonnes.

This is about 200 times more powerful than the nuclear bomb dropped on Hiroshima in 1945, which had an estimated explosive yield of about 15 kilotonnes of TNT.

It also far surpasses the destructive power of the bomb unleashed on Nagasaki, which had a yield of around 21 kilotonnes of TNT.

The hi-tech missile has integrated Multiple Independently Targetable Reentry Vehicle technology – allowing it to carry and release multiple nuclear warheads at once.

A single DF-5B missile can release up to 10 warheads, striking different targets across wide areas.

Since each warhead is independent, missile defence systems find it much harder to intercept, making this weapon far more lethal than other known weapons.

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CCTV described the missile as China’s “first-generation strategic ICBM”.

The DF-5B, first created in 2015, is an upgraded variant of China’s original DF-5 intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) which entered service in 1981.

It’s unclear why this information was released, but it is believed that Beijing wants to showcase its military modernisation and deter potential threats.

It comes just days after China deployed its most dangerous nuclear bombers to a tiny island, as revealed by satellite pictures.

Aerial photos show two hulking H-6 bombers on an airfield on Woody Island in the South China Sea, taken on May 19.

The long-range aircraft date back to the 1950s, and were modelled on Soviet-era warplanes.

But they have been upgraded to carry modern weapons, including hypersonic and nuclear missiles.

They are considered China’s most advanced bombers, and this is the first time they have been spotted on the outpost in five years.

US intelligence previously warned that China could seize Taiwan’s smaller islands as the first step of a full-scale invasion.

In September 2024, China launched a nuclear-capable missile into the Pacific Ocean, marking the first test in 40 years.

The ICBM, launched by the People’s Liberation Army Rocket Force, carried a dummy warhead.

The Chinese defence ministry said in a statement the rocket “fell into expected sea areas”, and that it was a “routine arrangement in our annual training plan”.

China said the test was not directed at any country or target, and that it “informed the countries concerned in advance”, reports claimed.

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The US president says Putin also suggested he would participate in talks aimed at reaching a new nuclear deal with Tehran.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has told Donald Trump in a telephone conversation that Moscow would have to respond to the recent Ukrainian drone attacks, the US president said.

Trump said on Wednesday that the two men “discussed the attack on Russia’s docked airplanes, by Ukraine, and also various other attacks that have been taking place by both sides.”

Putin “did say, and very strongly, that he will have to respond to the recent attack on the airfields”, Trump said in a social media post.

Al Jazeera’s Kimberly Halkett said that Trump described his 85-minute phone call with Putin as “a good conversation but not one that would lead to immediate peace”.

“You have to remember that Donald Trump, when he came into office, was very confident that he could end this war on day one, but here we are now in June and the fact is … this is far from resolved,” she said from the White House.

Moscow said earlier on Wednesday that military options were “on the table” for its response to Ukrainian attacks deep inside Russia and accused the West of being involved in them.

Russia also urged the US and Britain to restrain Kyiv after the attacks, which Ukrainian officials have lauded as showing Kyiv can still fight back after more than three years of war.

British and US officials have said they had no prior knowledge of the weekend attacks on Russian nuclear-capable long-range bombers.

In his social media post, Trump said he and Putin also discussed Iran. Putin suggested he would participate in talks aimed at reaching a new nuclear deal with Tehran, Trump said.

“I stated to President Putin that Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon and, on this, I believe that we were in agreement,” Trump said. He accused Iran of “slow-walking” decisions regarding the talks.

Putin told Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian that Moscow was ready to help advance talks on a nuclear deal, the Kremlin said on Tuesday.

But Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said earlier on Wednesday that Washington’s proposal was against Tehran’s national interests, amid sharp differences over whether Tehran can continue to enrich uranium.

The United Kingdom has announced a major investment in defence in response to a “new era of threats” driven by “growing Russian aggression”.

The UK’s Strategic Defence Review (SDR), unveiled on Monday, includes new investments in nuclear warheads, a fleet of new submarines and new munitions factories. Prime Minister Keir Starmer said the SDR would bring the country to “war-fighting readiness”.

“The threat we now face is more serious, more immediate and more unpredictable than at any time since the Cold War,” Starmer said as he delivered the review in Glasgow, Scotland.

The SDR described Russia as an “immediate and pressing” threat, and referred to China as a “sophisticated and persistent challenge”.

European nations have rushed to strengthen their armed forces in recent months, following Trump’s repeated demands that Europe must shoulder more responsibility for its security.

What are the key features of the UK’s Strategic Defence Review?

The defence review, the UK’s first since 2021, was led by former NATO Secretary-General George Robertson. Among the 62 recommendations in the SDR, all have been accepted by the government.

Starmer said the measures recommended in the review would bring “fundamental changes” to the armed forces, including “moving to war-fighting readiness”, re-centring a “NATO first” defence posture and accelerating innovation.

“Every part of society, every citizen of this country, has a role to play because we have to recognise that things have changed in the world of today,” he said. “The front line, if you like, is here.”

Boosting weapons production and stockpiles

Based on the recommendations in the review, the government said it would boost stockpiles and weapons production capacity, which could be scaled up if needed.

A total of 1.5 billion pounds ($2bn) will be dedicated to building “at least six munitions and energetics factories”, with plans to produce 7,000 long-range weapons.

In turn, UK ammunitions spending – just one component of overall military spending – is expected to hit 6 billion pounds ($8.1bn) over the current parliamentary term, which ends in 2029.

New attack submarines

There are also plans to build up to 12 new attack submarines by the late 2030s as part of the AUKUS military alliance with Australia and the United States – equivalent to a new submarine every 18 months.

This accounts for nearly half the projected spending outlined in the SDR.

Meanwhile, the Ministry of Defence (MoD) also said it would invest 15 billion pounds ($20.3bn) in its own nuclear warhead programme.

New F-35 fighter jets

The SDR recommended procuring new F-35 fighter jets and the Global Combat Aircraft Programme, a sixth-generation fighter produced jointly with Japan and Italy.

Use of technology to improve the army

The target size of the army will remain roughly the same, but the SDR recommended a slight increase in the number of regular soldiers “if funding allows”. There are currently about 71,000.

Instead of a dramatic increase in troop numbers, the SDR recommends using technology, drones and software to “increase lethality tenfold”.

To do this, the MoD plans to deliver a 1 billion pound ($1.35bn) “digital targeting web”, an AI-driven software tool designed to collect battlefield data and use it to enable faster decision making.

Investment in defence companies

More details about the SDR will be provided in the upcoming Defence Industrial Strategy, expected in the coming weeks, but UK defence companies will be among the big winners from the new SDR.

Though supposedly a 10-year review, past SDRs suggest its shelf life might be more limited.

The last SDR was published in 2021 and recommended “a strategic pivot towards the Indo-Pacific region to counter China’s influence and deepen ties with allies like Australia, India, and Japan”, in line with strategic priorities of the time.

This SDR, undertaken in the wake of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, has re-oriented the UK’s geographical priorities. In the coming years, those could change again.

Can the UK afford this defence expansion?

Proposals to prepare the UK’s armed forces to be “battle ready” will cost at least 67.6 billion pounds ($91.4bn) through to the late 2030s, according to costings and estimates provided in the SDR.

Before Monday’s announcement, the government had already pledged to increase spending on defence from 2.3 percent currently to 2.5 percent by 2027, an increase of about 6 billion pounds ($8.1bn) per year. This would raise 60 billion pounds over 10 years – a bit shy of the cost projected by the SDR.

The government has said it will cut overseas aid to fund that 0.2 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) rise in defence spending.

Critics say this will not be enough and that the measures outlined by the SDR will cost more like 3 percent of gross domestic product (GDP).

James Cartlidge, the shadow defence secretary, said the “authors of the strategic defence review were clear that 3 percent [not 2.5 percent] of GDP ‘established the affordability’ of the plan.”

In February, the Labour government said it had “an ambition” to raise defence spending to 3 percent in the next parliament (after 2029), but Cartlidge said: “That commitment cannot be guaranteed ahead of the next general election.”

According to researchers at the Institute for Fiscal Studies – an independent, London-based research organisation – raising defence spending to 3 percent of GDP by 2030 would require an extra 17 billion pounds between now and then, which the government has not yet accounted for.

But the UK could be required to raise spending even more than this. In discussions taking place in advance of the NATO summit in The Hague later this month, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte is understood to be pushing for member nations to commit 5 percent of GDP towards defence-related spending.

Rutte has proposed that NATO’s 32 members commit to spending 3.5 percent on hard defence and 1.5 percent on broader security, such as cyber, by 2032.

“At this Ministerial, we are going to take a huge leap forward,” Rutte stated before a meeting of defence ministers in Brussels on Thursday this week. “We will strengthen our deterrence and defence by agreeing ambitious new capability targets.” He specified air and missile defence, long-range weapons, logistics, and large land manoeuvre formations as among the alliance’s top priorities, according to a briefing note from NATO on Wednesday.

“We need more resources, forces and capabilities so that we are prepared to face any threat, and to implement our collective defence plans in full,” he said, adding: “We will need significantly higher defence spending. That underpins everything.”

Will taxes have to rise in the UK?

On Monday, Starmer refused to rule out another raid on the aid budget to fund higher military spending, and signalled that he was hopeful the extra investment could be supported by a growing the economy and generating more taxes to pay for defence.

After the SDR’s announcement, Paul Johnson, director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies, warned that the prime minister will need to make “really quite chunky tax increases” to pay for the plans.

Alternatively, increased defence spending could be siphoned off from other parts of the budget – for instance, through reduced state spending on areas like transport and energy infrastructure.

Washington has not been clear on ‘how and through what mechanism’ sanctions would be lifted, says Tehran.

Iran has demanded that the United States clarify exactly how sanctions will be lifted if the two sides are to reach a new agreement on Tehran’s nuclear programme.

Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Esmail Baghaei made the comments on Monday, days after the US submitted what it described as an “acceptable” proposal. Unverified reports claim that Iran sees the offer as a “non-starter” and is preparing to reject it.

The pair has conducted seven weeks of negotiations over the nuclear programme, with the US seeking assurances that it is peaceful, while Iran hopes to escape punishing sanctions that have battered its economy in recent years.

However, Tehran is now demanding Washington detail what it is offering, reflecting scepticism voiced earlier this year by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

In remarks carried by the official IRNA news agency, Baghaei stressed the need for guarantees regarding the “real end of the sanctions”, including details on “how and through what mechanism” they would be removed.

“The American side has not yet provided the necessary clarity in this regard,” he said.

Baghaei also reiterated Iran’s intention to continue enriching uranium for “peaceful” purposes.

US envoy Steve Witkoff has said President Donald Trump opposes Tehran continuing any enrichment, calling it a “red line”.

A leaked United Nations report shows that Iran has ramped up production of uranium enriched to 60 percent, short of the roughly 90 percent required for atomic weapons but significantly above the 4 percent or so needed for power production.

Baghaei dismissed the report as biased, accusing unnamed Western countries of pressuring the UN to act against Iran’s interests.

Official sources cited by The New York Times said the recent US proposal includes a call for Iran to end all enrichment.

While Tehran has confirmed receipt of the proposal, which the White House described as being in Iran’s “best interest”, it has said it is still reviewing the document.

“Receiving a text certainly does not mean accepting it, nor does it even mean that it is acceptable,” Baghaei said.

The Reuters news agency quoted an unnamed Iranian diplomat as saying that Tehran is in the process of “drafting a negative response to the US proposal, which could be interpreted as a rejection”.

The official described the proposal as a “non-starter” because it does not soften the US’s stance on enrichment or offer a “clear explanation” of sanctions relief, according to the report.

Iran has held five rounds of talks with the US since April 12 in search of a new agreement to replace the deal with the leading powers that Trump abandoned during his first term in 2018.

The United Nations nuclear watchdog has delivered its most damning allegations against Iran in nearly two decades.

It comes as the United States proposes a nuclear deal that it says is in Tehran’s best interests to accept.

But Tehran is accusing the West of political pressure and warns it will take “appropriate countermeasures” if European powers reimpose sanctions.

So is there still room for a deal?

Or will the US, United Kingdom, France and Germany declare Iran in violation of its nonproliferation obligations?

Presenter: James Bays

Guests:

Hassan Ahmadian – assistant professor at the University of Tehran

Ali Vaez – Iran project director at the International Crisis Group

Sahil Shah – independent security analyst specialising in nuclear disarmament and nonproliferation policy

A BRITISH businessman has been accused of spying and plotting to smuggle sensitive military technology to China.

The FBI claim investigators intercepted phone calls in which John Miller, 63, called Chinese leader Xi Jinping as “The Boss”.

The 63-year-old from Kent is also alleged to have tried to buy military hardware in the US for the People’s Liberation Army.

This included missile launchers, air defence radars and Black Hornet “microdrones” that can fly within feet of enemy soldiers and enter buildings to spy on troop positions.

Other equipment he attempted to purchase included a hand-held device approved by America’s National Security Agency for the secure communication of classified material.

Mr Miller also suggested smuggling a device by glueing it inside a food blender so it could then be “sent via DHL or Fedex to Hong Kong, according to US court papers.

The FBI said Mr Miller calling Xi “The Boss” showed his “awareness that he was acting at the direction and control of the [Chinese] government”.

He was arrested on April 24 after he was caught in a sting when the ‘arms dealers’ he was negotiating with turned out to be undercover FBI agents.

Mr Miller was on a business trip to Belgrade, Serbia, at the time and is still being held last night facing extradition to the US.

He is accused of conspiring with US-based Chinese national, Cui Guanghai, 43, and if convicted, both men face up to 40 years in prison.

Neighbours at his five-bedroom £1.5million home in Tunbridge Wells described him a “respectable family man”, according to the Mail on Sunday.

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The UN nuclear watchdog warns Tehran could be close to weapons-grade enriched uranium, as negotiations with the US continue.

The United Nations nuclear watchdog says Iran has increased its stockpile of highly enriched, near weapons-grade uranium by 50 percent in the last three months.

The report by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) on Saturday comes as nuclear deal negotiations are under way between the United States and Iran, with Tehran insisting its nuclear programme is for peaceful purposes only.

The IAEA said as of May 17, Iran had amassed 408.6kg (900.8 pounds) of uranium enriched up to 60 percent – the only non-nuclear weapon state to do so, according to the UN agency – and had increased its stockpile by almost 50 percent to 133.8kg since its last report in February.

The wide-ranging, confidential report seen by several news agencies said Iran carried out secret nuclear activities with material not declared to the IAEA at three locations that have long been under investigation, calling it a “serious concern” and warning Tehran to change its course.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, however, reaffirmed the country’s longstanding position, saying Tehran deems nuclear weapons “unacceptable”.

“If the issue is nuclear weapons, yes, we too consider this type of weapon unacceptable,” Araghchi, Iran’s lead negotiator in the nuclear talks with the US, said in a televised speech. “We agree with them on this issue.”

‘Both sides building leverage’

But the report, which was requested by the IAEA’s 35-nation board of governors in November, will allow for a push by the US, Britain, France and Germany to declare Iran in violation of its non-proliferation obligations.

On Friday, US President Donald Trump said Iran “cannot have a nuclear weapon”.

“They don’t want to be blown up. They would rather make a deal,” Trump said, adding: “That would be a great thing that we could have a deal without bombs being dropped all over the Middle East.”

In 2015, Iran reached a deal with the United Kingdom, US, Germany, France, Russia, China and the European Union, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. It involved the lifting of some sanctions on Tehran in return for limits on its nuclear development programme.

But in 2018, then US President Trump unilaterally quit the agreement and reimposed harsh sanctions. Tehran then rebuilt its stockpiles of enriched uranium.

In December last year, the IAEA said Iran was rapidly enriching uranium to 60 percent purity, moving closer to the 90 percent threshold needed for weapons-grade material.

Western nations say such intensive enrichment should not be part of a civilian nuclear programme, but Iran insists it is not developing weapons.

Hamed Mousavi, professor of political science at Tehran University, told Al Jazeera the IAEA findings could indicate a possible negotiation tool for Iran during its ongoing nuclear talks with the US.

“I think both sides are trying to build leverage against the other side. From the Iranian perspective, an advancement in the nuclear programme is going to bring them leverage at the negotiation table with the Americans,” he said.

On the other side, he said, the US could threaten more sanctions and may also refer the Iranian case to the UN Security Council for its breach of the 2006 non-proliferation agreement. However, he added that Iran has not made the “political decision” to build a possible bomb.

“Enriching up to 60 percent [of uranium] – from the Iranian perspective – is a sort of leverage against the Americans to lift sanctions,” Mousavi said.

VLADIMIR Putin will launch an assault on Lithuania next if he conquers Ukraine, an ex-CIA boss has warned.

The caution comes as Zelensky slammed the Russian despot for “stalling peace talks” following his dismal attempts to get to the negotiating table.

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David Petraus, a retired US general and director of the CIA, warned an attack on the Baltic state would not be an isolated event but part of a longer-term plan to test the West.

Speaking at the Policy Exchange Think-Tank in London, Petraeus said Lithuania has “featured prominently” in Putin’s speeches meaning he might turn on the NATO state for his next assault.

After mad Vlad has installed a “puppet leader to control all of Ukraine” there’s a strong chance he will turn his “focus on one of the Baltic states,” he added.

Taking aim at Trump, he said the US had dithered too much on “individual decisions” and was giving the Russian president too many second chances – causing immeasurable losses for Ukraine.

He said: “What we’ve seen is three incidences where the US President has threatened that in two weeks we’ll have to take a different approach. 

“We’ll see this time what actually happens. The US also temporised far too long over individual decisions such as M1 [Abrams] tanks.

“A blind man on a dark night could see it had to be the F-16 (a multi- role fighter aircraft).”

Ukraine responded yesterday saying: “The Russians’ fear of sending their ‘memorandum’ to Ukraine suggests that it is likely filled with unrealistic ultimatums, and they are afraid of revealing that they are stalling the peace process.”

The comments come after Trump issued Vlad with a two-week deadline for a ceasefire following Russia’s deadly attack on Ukraine earlier this week.

Trump said in the Oval Office on Wednesday: “I’m very disappointed at what happened a couple of nights now where people were killed in the middle of what you would call a negotiation.”

He added: “When I see rockets being shot into cities, that’s no good. We’re not going to allow it.”

When asked if Putin really wants to end the war, Trump replied: “I can’t tell you that, but I’ll let you know in about two weeks.

“Within two weeks. We’re gonna find out whether or not he’s tapping us along or not.

“And if he is, we’ll respond a little bit differently.”

One of the largest stumbling blocks which is delaying any peace deal is said to be over Putin’s desire to control his former Soviet states and keep them away from Nato.

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This includes Ukraine themselves with the Kremlin always saying Kyiv gaining access to the group is a complete no go under any circumstances.

Kyiv has repeatedly said that Moscow should have no say in its sovereign right to pursue Nato membership however.

He declared he will only call off the war in Ukraine if the West vows to keep its hands off Russia’s prized former Soviet states.

Putin even demanded he got the assurances in writing.

The Russian president said he wants a “written” pledge from Western leaders to stop Nato’s expansion to countries eastward, top Russian officials revealed to Reuters.

The eastward expansion refers to Ukraine, Georgia, Moldova and other former Soviet republics.

Putin is reportedly preparing for a major push to take more land in the north east.

Military analysts believe he is trying to press home his advantage and capture more Ukrainian land.

They warn that Putin only has a “four-month window” to get a breakthrough in Ukraine this year.

And this could be the beginning of Russia’s summer offensive targeting the border city of Kharkiv – the “fortress” city of Ukraine which put up the maximum resistance at the start of the invasion.

Reacting to the reports, German Chancellor Freidrich Merz predicted that peace was still a long way off.

He said: “Wars typically end because of economic or military exhaustion on one side or on both sides and in this war we are obviously still far from reaching that [situation].

“So we may have to prepare for a longer duration.”

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Trump’s latest comments come as China, North Korea, Russia say the Golden Dome missile defence system will create ‘space arms race’.

United States President Donald Trump says he has told Canada it will have to pay $61bn to be part of his proposed Gold Dome missile defence system “if they remain a separate, but unequal, Nation”.

In a post on TruthSocial, Trump claimed Canada “very much wants to be part of our fabulous Golden Dome System” and would gain free access if it joins with the US.

Participating in the proposed defence system would cost Canada “ZERO DOLLARS if they become our cherished 51st State”, Trump said, adding, “They are considering the offer!”

Trump’s post came just hours after Canada’s parliament hosted the UK’s King Charles III for a rare royal speech in which the monarch emphasised Canada’s sovereignty in “dangerous and uncertain” times, and amid the US president’s exhortations for the country to become part of the US.

Following the king’s speech, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney told Canadian Public broadcaster CBC that he hopes Canada will join ReArm Europe by July 1, in an effort to reduce dependence on the US for weapons.

Canada did not immediately respond to Trump’s latest comment, but Carney has previously confirmed his country has held “high-level” talks on the defence system issue with the US.

Funding, timeline uncertain

In total, Trump has claimed the Golden Dome system will cost some $175bn and would be completed by the end of his current term in 2029, although defence industry experts have questioned the feasibility of this timeline and budget.

Trump is hoping to secure an initial $25bn funding for the system through the sweeping “Big, Beautiful Bill” which is next to go up for a vote in the Senate after narrowly passing the Republican-controlled US House of Representatives last week.

The bill boosts spending on the military and border enforcement while cutting funding for social programmes, including Medicaid and food assistance that helped tens of millions of low-income Americans.

The Golden Dome is modelled after Israel’s Iron Dome, which also receives significant funding from the US, including $500m per year for its upkeep.

It is unclear how Trump would scale up the Iron Dome to cover the entire US, since Israel is only about the size of New Jersey, one of the smaller states in the US.

The Iron Dome is also designed to target short-range missiles, with a range of 1,000km (about 620 miles), while the main threat to the US would likely come from long-range ballistic and hypersonic missiles.

Golden Dome will create ‘space arms race’

China, North Korea and Russia have all criticised Trump’s plan to put weapons in space, which the US president described in detail for the first time last week.

China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs swiftly responded, with spokeswoman Mao Ning saying the plan “heightens the risk of space becoming a battlefield, fuels an arms race, and undermines international security”.

“The United States puts its own interests first and is obsessed with seeking its own absolute security, which violates the principle that no country’s security should come at the expense of others,” Mao Ning said.

North Korea’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs also responded, saying the US is “hell-bent on the moves to militarise outer space”.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Tuesday that the Golden Dome project undermines the foundations of “strategic stability” as it involves the creation of a global missile defence system.

According to Russia’s state news agency TASS, Zakharova said developing the Golden Dome would also lead to development of the “means of pre-launch missile destruction and infrastructure that ensures their use”.

“This is already a literal manifestation of the US’s highly dangerous doctrinal course toward delivering so-called preventive, but essentially first strikes,” she said, warning it would turn space into a “weaponised environment” and an “arena of armed confrontation”.

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem says the US president ‘wants peace’ but will not allow Iran to obtain a nuclear weapon.

Washington, DC – United States Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem says she delivered a message from President Donald Trump to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that the two countries should be aligned on how to approach Iran.

Noem, who concluded a visit to Israel on Monday, told Fox News that her talks with Netanyahu were “candid and direct”. Her comments come days after US and Iranian officials held their fifth round of nuclear talks in Rome.

“President Trump specifically sent me here to have a conversation with the prime minister about how those negotiations are going and how important it is that we stay united and let this process play out,” she said.

On Sunday, Trump suggested that the talks were progressing well.

“We’ve had some very, very good talks with Iran,” the US president told reporters. “And I don’t know if I’ll be telling you anything good or bad over the next two days, but I have a feeling I might be telling you something good.”

Last week, CNN reported, citing unidentified US officials, that Israel was preparing for strikes against Iran’s nuclear facilities, despite the US-led talks.

Iran has promised to respond forcefully to any Israeli attack, and accused Netanyahu of working to undermine US diplomacy.

Iranian Minister of Foreign Affairs Abbas Araghchi said last week that the Israeli prime minister is “desperate to dictate what the US can and cannot do”.

Israel has been sceptical about the nuclear negotiations, and Netanyahu has been claiming for years that Iran is on the cusp of acquiring a nuclear bomb. Israeli officials portray Iran – which backs regional groups engaged in armed struggle against Israel – as a major threat.

On Monday, Noem said that the US understands that Netanyahu does not trust Iran.

“The message to the American people is: We have a president that wants peace, but also a president that will not tolerate nuclear Iran capability in the future. They will not be able to get a nuclear weapon, and this president will not allow it,” she said.

“But he also wants this prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, to be on the same page with him.”

A major sticking point in the talks has been whether Iran would be allowed to enrich its own uranium.

US officials have said they want Iran not just to scale back its nuclear programme, but also to completely stop enriching uranium – a position that Tehran has said is a nonstarter.

Enrichment is the process of altering the uranium atom to create nuclear fuel.

Iranian officials say enrichment for civilian purposes is a sovereign right that is not prohibited by the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).

Tehran denies seeking a nuclear weapon, while Israel is widely believed to have an undeclared nuclear arsenal.

During his first term, in 2018, Trump nixed the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), which had seen Iran scale back its nuclear programme in exchange for the lifting of international sanctions against its economy.

Since then, the US has been piling sanctions on Iran. Tehran has responded by escalating its nuclear programme.

On Monday, Iran ruled out temporarily suspending uranium enrichment to secure an interim deal with the US.

Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baqaei stressed that Iran is not buying time with the talks.

“We have entered the course of talks seriously and purposefully with the intention of reaching a fair agreement. We have proved our seriousness,” Baqaei was quoted as saying by the Tasnim news agency.

Negotiations between Washington and Tehran looking shaky as Iran resists US negotiator Witkoff’s ‘red line’.

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has derided demands from the United States that it halt nuclear enrichment as negotiations between the two countries hang in the balance.

“Saying things like ‘We will not allow Iran to enrich uranium’ is nonsense. No one [in Iran] is waiting for others’ permission,” said Khamenei in a speech reported by the country’s semi-official Mehr News Agency on Tuesday.

He added that he did not know whether talks would “bring results”.

Since mid-April, Washington and Tehran have held four rounds of Omani-mediated talks aimed at getting Iran to limit its nuclear programme in exchange for sanctions relief.

However, repeated clashes between the pair have thrown the next round of negotiations, which the news agency Reuters said were expected to take place in Rome at the weekend, into doubt.

US President Donald Trump ditched the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action signed by Iran and world powers during his last term in office. Intent on striking a new deal since his return to power in January, he has revived his “maximum pressure” approach against Iran, warning last week that talks needed to “move quickly or something bad is going to happen”.

Tehran confirmed on Tuesday that it has received and is reviewing a US proposal, but Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister Majid Takht-Ravanchi had said the previous day that talks would fail if Washington insisted that Tehran refrained from domestic enrichment of uranium, which the US says is a possible pathway to developing nuclear bombs.

Iran currently enriches uranium to 60 percent, far above the 3.67-percent limit set in the 2015 deal but below the 90 percent needed for a nuclear warhead. It has repeatedly insisted its programme is for peaceful purposes and is “non-negotiable”.

However, US negotiator Steve Witkoff has dubbed the continuation of the programme a “red line”. On Sunday, he reiterated that the US “cannot allow even 1 percent of an enrichment capability”.

Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said on Sunday that a deal ensuring Iran would not have nuclear weapons was “within reach”.

However, he underlined, Iran would continue enriching uranium “with or without a deal”.

In addressing the talks regarding Iran’s peaceful nuclear program, our U.S. interlocutors are naturally free to publicly state whatever they deem fit to ward off Special Interest groups; malign actors which set the agendas of at least previous Administrations.

Iran can only…

— Seyed Abbas Araghchi (@araghchi) May 18, 2025

Tehran, Iran – Iran’s political and military leaders are pointing the finger back at Donald Trump after the United States president sharpened his rhetoric during his first major tour of the Middle East.

In a speech to a group of teachers gathered for a state ceremony in Tehran on Saturday, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said some of Trump’s comments were not even worth responding to.

“The level of those remarks is so low that they are a disgrace for the one who uttered them and a disgrace to the American nation,” he said, to chants of “Death to America” and others from the crowd.

Khamenei added that Trump “lied” when he said he wants to use power towards peace, as Washington has backed “massacring” Palestinians and others across the region. He called Israel a “dangerous cancerous tumour” that must be “uprooted”.

Meanwhile, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian also told a gathering of navy officers on Saturday that Trump is extending a message of peace while threatening destruction at the same time as backing Israel’s “genocide” in the Gaza Strip.

“Which one of this president’s words should we believe? His message of peace, or his message of massacre of human beings?” the Iranian president said, pointing out that Trump sanctioned the International Criminal Court (ICC) in a move that was internationally criticised.

The statements came after Trump used his Middle East tour – during which he signed huge deals with Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates – to heap praise on Arab leaders neighbouring Iran and blasting the leadership in Tehran.

The US president told Arab leaders they were developing their infrastructure while Iran’s “landmarks are collapsing into rubble” after its theocratic establishment replaced a monarchy in a 1979 revolution.

He said Iran’s leaders have “managed to turn green farmland into dry deserts” as a result of corruption and mismanagement, and pointed out that Iranians are experiencing power outages several hours a day.

The blackouts, a result of a years-long energy crisis that is hurting Iran’s already strained economy, are expected to linger for the rest of this year as well, according to Iranian authorities.

The largest associations of the mining, steel and cement industries in Iran on Saturday wrote a joint letter to Pezeshkian, urgently requesting him to review a 90 percent electricity use restriction imposed on the critical sectors.

Trump, who hailed Syria’s interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa and lifted sanctions on Damascus, also took aim at Iran’s regional policy.

He described Tehran’s support for the fallen establishment of President Bashar al-Assad as a cause of “misery and death” and regional destabilisation.

Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi described the US president’s remarks as “deceptive”, telling state media on Friday it was the US that hampered Iran through sanctions and military threats while backing Israel and attacking Syria.

Parliament chief Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, who was addressing an Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) conference in Indonesia, said Trump’s remarks showed he was “living in a delusion”.

Hossein Salami, the commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), addressed Trump directly on Friday and said even though Iran has beautiful landmarks, “we take pride in the elevation of character, identity, culture, and Islam”.

The sharp rhetoric in response to Trump’s latest controversial comments come days after he teased that he may start calling the “Persian Gulf” the “Arabian Gulf” soon.

This angered Iranians across the board, prompting criticism of any attempt to rename the key waterway from average citizens online, authorities, local media, and even some pro-Trump Iranians outside the country who have been advocating for US sanctions and regime change.

Scepticism over Iran-US deal

Both Iran and the US say they would prefer an agreement that would serve to quickly de-escalate tensions surrounding Iran’s nuclear programme, despite the latest war of words.

But after four rounds of negotiations mediated by Oman, any prospective deal – which would lift sanctions in exchange for making sure Iran would not have a nuclear bomb – still appears to face significant hurdles.

Trump said Tehran has been handed a proposal to rapidly advance towards a deal, but Iran’s Araghchi on Friday said no written proposal was produced yet amid “confusing and contradictory” rhetoric from Washington.

“Mark my words: there is no scenario in which Iran abandons its hard-earned right to enrichment for peaceful purposes: a right afforded to all other NPT signatories, too,” he wrote in a post on X, in reference to the Non-Proliferation Treaty.

Kazem Gharibabadi, a senior nuclear negotiator, on Friday rejected reports by Western media outlets that Iran may agree to fully halt its enrichment of uranium for the remainder of the Trump presidency to build trust.

“The right to enrich is our absolute red line! No halt to enrichment is acceptable.”

Trump in 2018 unilaterally withdrew from a landmark nuclear accord signed between Iran and world powers three years earlier, imposing the harshest sanctions yet by the US that have only intensified during the latest negotiations.

The nuclear deal set a 3.67 percent enrichment rate with first-generation centrifuges for civilian use in Iran, in exchange for lifting United Nations sanctions. Iran is now enriching up to 60 percent and has enough fissile material for multiple bombs, but has made no effort to build one yet.

The US president has repeatedly threatened to unleash air strikes targeting Iran’s programme if a deal isn’t reached.

United States President Donald Trump says that Iran has his administration’s proposal regarding its rapidly advancing nuclear programme as negotiations between the two countries continue.

Trump made the remarks on Friday on board Air Force One as he ended his trip to the United Arab Emirates. It is the first time he has acknowledged sending a proposal to Tehran after multiple rounds of negotiations between US Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff and Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi.

“We’re in very serious negotiations with Iran for long-term peace,” Trump told a journalist when asked about the proposal.

“We’re not going to be making any nuclear dust in Iran. I think we’re getting close to maybe doing a deal without having to do this,” he said.

“But most importantly, they know they have to move quickly, or something bad is going to happen.”

On Thursday, Araghchi spoke to journalists at the Tehran International Book Fair and said that Iran had not received any proposal from the US yet.

Araghchi also criticised what he called conflicting and inconsistent statements from the Trump administration, describing them as either a sign of disarray in Washington or a calculated negotiation strategy.

Witkoff at one point suggested that Iran could enrich uranium at 3.67 percent, then later said that all Iranian enrichment must stop.

“We are hearing many contradictory statements from the United States – from Washington, from the president, and from the new administration,” Araghchi said.

“Sometimes we hear two or three different positions in a single day.”

Iranian and American officials have met in Oman and Rome in recent weeks for the negotiations mediated by Oman’s Foreign Minister Badr al-Busaidi, a trusted interlocutor between the two nations.

The talks seek to limit Iran’s nuclear programme in exchange for the lifting of some of the crushing economic sanctions the US has imposed on the Islamic republic.

Trump has previously threatened to launch attacks targeting Iran’s nuclear programme if a deal isn’t reached.

Some Iranian officials have warned that Tehran could pursue a nuclear weapon with their stockpile of uranium enriched to near weapons-grade levels.

Separately on Friday, Iranian officials also met officials from Britain, France and Germany in Istanbul to discuss their nuclear negotiations with Washington.

Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister Kazem Gharibabadi, who attended the talks in the Turkish city, said in a post on X: “We exchanged views and discussed the latest status of the indirect nuclear negotiations and the lifting of sanctions.”

Gharibabadi added that if necessary, Tehran would meet with the so-called E3 – the European parties to the 2015 nuclear deal, along with China, Russia and the United States – once again to continue discussions, after several meetings since last year.

Trump had effectively torpedoed the deal during his first term by unilaterally abandoning it in 2018 and reimposing sanctions on Iran’s banking sector and oil exports.

A year later, Iran responded by rolling back its own commitments under the deal, which provided relief from sanctions in return for UN-monitored restrictions on Iran’s nuclear activities.

Donald Trump says he thinks the US is close to doing a nuclear deal with Iran. The US president made the comments in Qatar, where he praised the Emir for helping to push for a diplomatic solution, rather than war.

Iran’s president says his nation will not be intimidated by threats as Trump accuses Tehran of carrying out proxy wars.

Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian said his country would not “bow to any bully” in response to United States President Donald Trump’s criticism of Tehran during his ongoing three-day Gulf tour.

“He [Trump] thinks he can come here, chant slogans, and scare us. For us, martyrdom is far sweeter than dying in bed. You came to frighten us? We will not bow to any bully,” he said on Wednesday in comments broadcast live on state TV.

Earlier in the day, during the GCC summit in Riyadh, Trump said that while he wanted to make a deal with Iran, the country “must stop sponsoring terror, halt its bloody proxy wars, and permanently and verifiably cease its pursuit of nuclear weapons”.

Washington and Tehran have held four meetings that were mediated by Oman to help reach a deal over the latter’s nuclear programme.

While attending a state dinner in the Qatari capital in Doha on Wednesday, Trump repeated his publicly stated desire for a peaceful resolution to Iran’s nuclear programme and suggested the ball is in Tehran’s court.

“It’s a perilous situation, and we want to do the right thing,” Trump said. “We want to do something that’s going to save maybe millions of lives. Because things like that get started, and they get out of control.”

On Tuesday, Trump said that he wanted “to make a deal with Iran”, but “if Iran’s leadership rejects this olive branch … we will have no choice but to inflict massive maximum pressure”. He added that he would not allow Iran to have a nuclear weapon.

Successive US administrations have sought to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon. A sustained effort by world powers during the Barack Obama administration culminated in a 2015 agreement called the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).

But when Trump succeeded Obama as US president, he unilaterally withdrew the US from the nuclear agreement in 2018, causing the deal to crumble.

Despite ongoing talks, the Trump administration has continued to impose sanctions on Iran.

On Wednesday, the US issued sanctions targeting Iran for efforts to domestically manufacture components for ballistic missiles, the US Department of the Treasury said.

The sanctions target six individuals and 12 entities for what the Treasury Department said was “their involvement in efforts to help the Iranian regime domestically source the manufacturing of critical materials needed for Tehran’s ballistic missile program”.