Iranian speaker says US talks happening because ‘the bully backed down’

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi will visit Saudi Arabia and Qatar on Saturday, one day before the fourth round of indirect nuclear talks between Tehran and Washington in Muscat, Qatari news website The New Arab reported on Friday.

According to unnamed Iranian sources cited by the outlet, Araghchi will brief Saudi officials on the status of the negotiations with the United States. The visit also includes discussions on regional developments, particularly the ongoing war in Gaza and efforts to end the humanitarian crisis there.

Araghchi is expected to travel to Doha after his meetings in Riyadh to attend the Arab-Iranian Dialogue Conference.

A senior intelligence official from the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said on Thursday that foreign powers have shifted to a hybrid warfare strategy aimed at undermining the Islamic Republic across multiple sectors.

“The model of toppling the establishment has changed, but the objective is the same,” said Brigadier General Mehdi Sayyari, deputy head of the IRGC Intelligence Organization. “Today, we are being targeted across social, cultural, economic, political, scientific, and security fields.”

Speaking at a public event in Mashhad, Sayyari said that foreign intelligence services are coordinating efforts to destabilize the country internally. “Military, security, and cyber operations are designed to generate unrest and instability. If they don’t succeed in this, none of these tools will have an impact,” he said.

Sayyari added that opponents have focused on weakening the role of religion in society, citing recent unrest over the issue of the hijab. “One of the dissidents abroad said hijab is an issue the Islamic Republic can neither fully implement nor abandon,” he said.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi on Friday dismissed recent satellite imagery reports about a suspected nuclear facility in Iran, linking them to efforts to undermine upcoming nuclear talks with the United States.

“Like clockwork, more Very Scary Satellite Images are being circulated as Iran-US indirect nuclear talks are set to resume,” Araghchi wrote on X, in an apparent reference to a Fox News report citing the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI).

Araghchi accused Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of trying to influence US policy through proxies. “With his credibility in tatters and exposed as a saboteur, Netanyahu... is turning to both old and new sock puppets,” he wrote. “This time, he is using Saddam’s Iranian henchmen. They may come cheap, but hiring a literal cult only conveys utter desperation.”

The remarks came after Fox News reported, based on NCRI information and satellite images, that Iran has operated a secret tritium extraction facility for more than a decade. The NCRI said the Rainbow Site in Semnan Province is used for tritium extraction, which is “used to enhance nuclear weapons” and has “virtually no peaceful or commercial applications.”

Iran’s mission to the United Nations on Thursday rejected a Fox News report on an alleged secret nuclear weapons facility in Semnan Province, calling it “fabricated” and accusing the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) of spreading false information.

“This fabricated report follows the usual pattern of the NCRI terrorist group, which produces fake reports in the form of so-called intelligence and delivers them to Western services, including in the United States,” the Iranian mission said in a statement carried by state news agency IRNA.

“When these services realize the reports are baseless, the group then turns to Western media to amplify them,” it added.

Fox News earlier reported, based on satellite images and information from the NCRI, that the “Rainbow Site” has been operating for more than a decade under the cover of a chemical company and is used for tritium extraction — a process with “virtually no peaceful or commercial applications” and known to be “used to enhance nuclear weapons.”

Satellite images obtained by Fox News show what appears to be a previously undisclosed Iranian nuclear weapons facility in Semnan Province, according to the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI).

The site, known as the “Rainbow Site,” has reportedly been in operation for over a decade and covers nearly 2,500 acres. It has operated under the cover of a chemical company called Diba Energy Siba, the group said.

According to NCRI, the facility’s main purpose is the extraction of tritium, a radioactive isotope used to enhance nuclear weapons.

"Unlike uranium enrichment, tritium has virtually no peaceful or commercial applications, casting further doubt on Iran’s longstanding claims that its nuclear ambitions are solely for energy or civilian use," Fox News wrote.