Iran says no to nuclear talks during conflict as UN urges restraint
DUBAI/JERUSALEM, June 20 (Reuters) - Iran said on Friday it would not discuss the future of its nuclear programme while under attack by Israel, as Europe tried to coax Tehran back into negotiations and the United States considers whether to get involved in the conflict.
A week into its campaign, Israel said it had struck dozens of military targets, including missile production sites, a research body it said was involved in nuclear weapons development in Tehran and military facilities in western and central Iran.
The Israeli military later said they had struck surface-to-air missile batteries in southwestern Iran as part of efforts to achieve air superiority over the country. Explosions were heard in Iran's southwestern Khuzestan province and at least four people there were killed, IRNA news agency reported.
At least five people were injured when Israel hit a five-storey building in Tehran housing a bakery and a hairdresser's, Fars news agency reported. Iranian air defences were activated on Friday evening, Fars news agency reported.
Iran fired missiles at Beersheba in southern Israel and Haifa in the north, causing damage to an Ottoman-era mosque, according to Foreign Minister Gideon Saar. A foreign ministry video also showed extensive damage to a nearby high-rise building that houses a branch of Israel's Interior Ministry.
Haifa is home to Israel's busiest seaport and a naval base.
Fars news agency quoted an Iranian military spokesman as saying Tehran's missile and drone attacks on Friday had used long-range and ultra-heavy missiles against military sites, defence industries and command and control centres.
About 20 missiles were fired in those latest Iranian strikes, an Israeli military official said, and at least two people were hurt, according to the Israeli ambulance service.
Israel's envoy to the United Nations, Danny Danon, told the U.N. Security Council his country would not stop its attacks "until Iran's nuclear threat is dismantled". Iran's U.N. envoy Amir Saeid Iravani called for Security Council action and said Tehran was alarmed by reports that the U.S. may join the war.
NUCLEAR RISKS
The head of the U.N. nuclear watchdog warned against attacks on nuclear facilities and called for maximum restraint.
"Armed attack on nuclear facilities... could result in radioactive releases with great consequences within and beyond the boundaries of the state which has been attacked," Rafael Grossi, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, told the Security Council.
He spoke a day after an Israeli military official said it had been "a mistake" for a military spokesperson to have said Israel had struck Bushehr, Iran's only nuclear power plant. He said he could neither confirm nor deny that Russian-built Bushehr, located on the Gulf coast, had been hit.
Iran said on Friday its air defences had been activated in Bushehr, without elaborating.
Israel says it is determined to destroy Iran's nuclear capabilities but that it wants to avoid any nuclear disaster.
U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, also speaking at the world body's Security Council, said the Iran-Israel conflict could "ignite a fire no one can control" and called on all parties to "give peace a chance".
Russia and China demanded immediate de-escalation.
The White House said on Thursday President Donald Trump would decide on U.S. involvement in the conflict in the next two weeks. Trump presided over a national security meeting about Iran on Friday with top aides at the White House, a U.S. official said.
Trump's special envoy Steve Witkoff is in regular contact with the Iranians, with Qatar acting as an intermediary, the official added.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi said there was no room for negotiations with the U.S. "until Israeli aggression stops". But he later arrived in Geneva for talks with European foreign ministers at which Europe hopes to establish a path back to diplomacy over Iran's nuclear programme.
Before the meeting with France, Britain, Germany and the European Union's foreign policy chief, two diplomats said Araqchi would be told the U.S. is still open to direct talks. But expectations for a breakthrough are low, diplomats say.
URANIUM ENRICHMENT
A senior Iranian official told Reuters Iran was ready to discuss limitations on uranium enrichment but that any proposal for zero enrichment - not being able to enrich uranium at all - would be rejected, "especially now under Israel's strikes".
Israel's Foreign Minister Saar, speaking in Haifa, said he was very sceptical about Iran's intentions. "We know from the record of Iran they are not negotiating honestly," he said.
Israel began attacking Iran last Friday, saying its longtime enemy was on the verge of developing nuclear weapons. Iran, which says its nuclear programme is only for peaceful purposes, retaliated with missile and drone strikes on Israel.
Israel is widely assumed to possess nuclear weapons. It neither confirms nor denies this.
Israeli air attacks have killed 639 people in Iran, according to the Human Rights Activists News Agency, a U.S.-based human rights organisation that tracks Iran. The dead include the military's top echelon and nuclear scientists.
In Israel, 24 civilians have been killed in Iranian missile attacks, according to authorities.
Reuters could not independently verify casualty figures for either side.
Western and regional officials say Israel is trying to shatter the government of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
Iranian opposition groups think their time may be near, but activists involved in previous protests say they are unwilling to unleash mass unrest with their nation under attack.
Iranian state media reported rallies of "solidarity and resistance" in several cities.
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