US President Donald Trump’s Middle East envoy-designate Steve Witkoff gives a speech at the inaugural parade inside Capital One Arena on the inauguration day of Trump’s second presidential term, in Washington, DC, Jan. 20, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Carlos Barria

i24 News – A new round of nuclear talks between Iran and the United States kicked off in Rome on Saturday, under the shadow of President Donald Trump’s threat to unleash military action if diplomacy fails.

Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi and Trump’s Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff will negotiate indirectly through an Omani official who will shuttle messages between the two sides, Iranian officials said, a week after a first round of indirect talks in Muscat that both sides described as “constructive.”

Araqchi and Witkoff interacted briefly at the end of the first round, but officials from the two countries have not held direct negotiations since 2015 under former US President Barack Obama.

Araqchi called on “all parties involved in the talks to seize the opportunity to reach a reasonable and logical nuclear deal.”

Trump told reporters on Friday: “I’m for stopping Iran, very simply, from having a nuclear weapon. They can’t have a nuclear weapon. I want Iran to be great and prosperous and terrific.”

Meanwhile, Israel has not ruled out an attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities in the coming months, according to an Israeli official and two other people familiar with the matter.

Trump, who ditched a 2015 nuclear pact between Iran and six powers during his first term in 2018 and reimposed crippling sanctions on Tehran, has revived his “maximum pressure” campaign on the country since returning to the White House in January.

Since 2019, Iran has breached and far surpassed the 2015 deal’s limits on its uranium enrichment, producing stocks far above what is necessary for a civilian energy program.