TEHRAN: Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi and his negotiating team left Tehran for Geneva on Wednesday, state TV reported ahead of a third round of talks with the US.&nbsp;Washington and Tehran have already held two rounds of Oman-mediated talks aimed at reaching a deal on Iran&#39;s nuclear program.&nbsp;The US has repeatedly called for zero uranium enrichment by Iran but has also sought to address its ballistic missile program and support for militant groups in the region, demands Iran has rejected.&nbsp;US President Donald Trump on Tuesday said once again that Iran would never be allowed to build a nuclear weapon, saying Tehran&#39;s leaders were &quot;at this moment again pursuing their sinister nuclear ambitions&quot;.&nbsp;Iran has repeatedly denied it is seeking a bomb but insists it has the right to use nuclear technology for peaceful purposes.&nbsp;Trump, who has ratcheted up pressure on Iran to reach an agreement, has deployed a significant naval force to the Middle East.&nbsp;Iran, for its part, has conducted several rounds of military drills in recent days, including in the country&#39;s south and near the strategic Strait of Hormuz in the Gulf.

Asia

Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi traveled to Geneva for a third round of Oman-mediated nuclear talks with the US. Washington demands zero uranium enrichment and curbs on missiles, while Iran denies seeking nuclear weapons and defends peaceful nuclear rights.

Iran's top diplomat leaves for Geneva for talks with US

WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump on Thursday called for a brand new nuclear treaty after the last agreement with Russia expired, prompting fears of a new global arms race. The Trump administration has repeatedly pressed for a new treaty that includes China, whose arsenal is growing but remains significantly smaller than those of Russia and the United States. Beijing has publicly rejected the pressure. Trump had been mostly mum about Russian calls to extend New START, the 2010 treaty that imposed the last restrictions on the two largest nuclear powers after decades of agreements dating back to the Cold War. But hours after it expired, Trump said that the treaty, signed by predecessor Barack Obama and extended by Joe Biden, was &quot;badly negotiated&quot; and &quot;is being grossly violated.&quot; &quot;We should have our Nuclear Experts work on a new, improved, and modernized Treaty that can last long into the future,&quot; he wrote on his Truth Social platform. Asked if Washington and Moscow had agreed to stick to the terms of the expired START treaty while negotiations on a new accord are ongoing, White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said: &quot;Not to my knowledge.&quot; Russia refused inspections under New START as relations with the Biden administration deteriorated. It said on Wednesday that it no longer considered itself bound by the number of nuclear warheads because New START had expired. Despite the stalemate on New START, Trump has enthusiastically restarted diplomacy with Russia and invited President Vladimir Putin to Alaska last August. The United States announced Thursday that it was resuming military dialogue with Russia after three-way talks in Abu Dhabi on the Ukraine war. &#39;Unconstrained nuclear competition&#39;&nbsp;Campaigners have warned that the end of the New START treaty could trigger a global arms race, and urged nuclear powers to enter negotiations. A group of former senior arms control officials from around the world, in a joint statement Thursday, called on the United States and Russia to agree to keep observing New START&#39;s limits as a first step. The end of New START &quot;will reduce nuclear stability and predictability, threaten global security, and increase the risk of a new era of unconstrained nuclear competition,&quot; they wrote. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said the nuclear treaties between the United States and Russia, after more than half a century, were at a &quot;grave moment.&quot; &quot;This dissolution of decades of achievement could not come at a worse time &mdash; the risk of a nuclear weapon being used is the highest in decades,&quot; Guterres said, after Russian suggestions of using tactical nuclear weapons early in the Ukraine war. A NATO official, speaking on condition of anonymity, called for &quot;restraint and responsibility&quot; and said that the US-led military alliance &quot;will continue to take steps necessary&quot; to ensure its defense. The official condemned &quot;Russia&#39;s irresponsible nuclear rhetoric.&quot; China rejects pressure&nbsp;On Wednesday, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said that arms control was &quot;impossible&quot; without including China. China&#39;s foreign ministry expressed regret on Thursday over the demise of New START but said Beijing &quot;will not participate in nuclear disarmament negotiations at this stage.&quot; &quot;China&#39;s nuclear capabilities are of a totally different scale as those of the United States and Russia,&quot; foreign ministry spokesman Lin Jian told a news conference. Russia and the United States together control more than 80% of the world&#39;s nuclear warheads. China&#39;s nuclear arsenal is growing faster than any country&#39;s, by about 100 new warheads a year since 2023, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. China is estimated to have at least 600 nuclear warheads, the institute says &mdash; well below the 1,500 each at which Russia and the United States were capped under New START. France and Britain, treaty-bound US allies, together have another 100. Daryl Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association, which warns of nuclear risks, agreed that China should engage. But &quot;there is no indication that Trump or his team have taken the time to propose risk reduction or arms control talks with China since returning to office in 2025,&quot; Kimball said.

Europe

Americas

The Trump administration has repeatedly pressed for a new treaty that includes China, whose arsenal is growing but remains significantly smaller than those of Russia and the United States. Beijing has publicly rejected the pressure.

Trump urges new nuclear treaty after Russia agreement ends

WASHINGTON: The last nuclear treaty between Russia and the United States expired Thursday, abruptly ending decades of restrictions on how many warheads the two top powers can deploy and triggering fears of a global arms race. New START, signed during a warmer period of relations, ended with the turn of the calendar to February 5, with President Donald Trump not following up on Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin&#39;s proposal to extend the treaty&#39;s limits for one year. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called it a &quot;<a href="https://www.pakistantv.com/article/japan-restarts-worlds-biggest-nuclear-plant" style="color:#0073e6;">grave moment</a> for international peace and security&quot; and urged Washington and Moscow to head quickly to the negotiating table. &quot;For the first time in more than half a century, we face a world without any binding limits on the strategic nuclear arsenals of the Russian Federation and the United States of America,&quot; Guterres said in a statement, which considered the treaty over at midnight GMT or 7 pm in New York. &quot;This dissolution of decades of achievement could not come at a worse time &mdash; the risk of a nuclear weapon being used is the highest in decades,&quot; he said, after Russian suggestions of using tactical nuclear weapons early in the Ukraine war. Pope Leo XIV said each side needed to do &quot;everything possible&quot; to avert a new arms race. &quot;I urge you not to abandon this instrument without seeking to ensure that it is followed up in a concrete and effective manner,&quot; the American-born pope said at his weekly general audience. Russia&#39;s foreign ministry said it considered that both countries are &quot;no longer bound by any obligations or symmetrical declarations within the context of the treaty.&quot; &quot;The Russian Federation intends to act responsibly and prudently,&quot; it added, but warned it was ready to take &quot;decisive&quot; countermeasures if its national security is threatened. US demands China involvement&nbsp;Trump has frequently lashed out at international limits on the United States and called for nuclear testing to <a href="https://www.pakistantv.com/article/trump-says-hes-ordered-us-to-start-nuclear-weapons-testing" style="color:#0073e6;">resume</a> after a long moratorium, although he has not followed up. But some observers say the expiration of New START owes less to ideology than to the workings of the Trump administration, where career diplomats are sidelined, simply not having the bandwidth to negotiate a complex agreement. Trump, asked in October in front of his helicopter about Putin&#39;s proposal for a one-year extension, said it sounded &quot;like a good idea,&quot; but there were no subsequent negotiations. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Wednesday that Trump would make a decision later and reiterated a call for a new agreement that includes China. &quot;The president&#39;s been clear in the past that in order to have true arms control in the 21st century, it&#39;s impossible to do something that doesn&#39;t include China, because of their vast and rapidly growing stockpile,&quot; Rubio said. China&#39;s nuclear arsenal is growing quickly, with an estimated 550 strategic nuclear launchers, which is still well below the 800 each of Russia and the United States capped under New START. France and Britain, treaty-bound US allies, together have another 100. Trump, in his first term, also looked ready to let New START lapse as he insisted on including China, with a US negotiator even provocatively setting up an empty seat with a Chinese flag. Daryl Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association, which warns of nuclear risks, agreed that China should engage on its nuclear program but wondered if Trump has even tried. &quot;Despite Trump&#39;s talk about involving China in nuclear negotiations, there is no indication that Trump or his team have taken the time to propose risk reduction or arms control talks with China since returning to office in 2025,&quot; Kimball said. He said that Trump and Putin could agree to keep current limits and then press China. Joe Biden agreed with Russia to extend New START for five years after he defeated Trump in the 2020 election, but tensions between the two countries later soared over Moscow&#39;s invasion of Ukraine. The treaty, signed in 2010 in Prague by then presidents Barack Obama and Dmitry Medvedev, limited each side&#39;s nuclear arsenal to 1,550 deployed strategic warheads, a reduction of nearly 30% from the previous limit set in 2002.

New START, signed during a warmer period of relations, ends on February 5, with President Donald Trump not following up on Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin's proposal to extend the treaty's limits for one year.

Articles tagged with "nuclear talks"

Iran's top diplomat leaves for Geneva for talks with US

Trump urges new nuclear treaty after Russia agreement ends

Last US-Russia nuclear treaty ends in 'grave moment' for world