US senator slams Pezeshkian’s UN speech on rejecting nuclear bomb

US Special Envoy Steve Witkoff said on Wednesday that Iran is in a tough position but that Washington is carrying on a dialogue with its Mideast nemesis as new sanctions loom.

"With regard to Iran, we're talking to them. And why wouldn't we? We talk to everybody, as well we should. That's the job. Our job is to solve things diplomatically," Witkoff told the Concordia conference in New York on Wednesday.

"I would say with Iran that they're in a tough position. Now, snapbacks are going to ensue in what, two days or three days, something like that. And I think that we have no desire to hurt them," he added, referring to so-called "snapback" sanctions triggered by European states due for Sept. 28.

"I think we have a desire, however, to either realize a permanent solution and negotiate around snapbacks, and if we can't, then snapbacks will be what they are. They're the right medicine for what's happening."

A senior Iranian lawmaker dismissed remarks by US Special Envoy Steve Witkoff, who earlier in the day said Washington was carrying on a dialogue with Tehran.

“Steve Witkoff’s remarks about ongoing US negotiations with Iran are a lie,” Ebrahim Azizi, head of the Iranian parliament’s National Security and Foreign Policy Committee, said on Wednesday.

The United Kingdom, France and Germany last month triggered the so-called "snapback" of international sanctions on Tehran which are set to take effect on September 28.

"We need our European allies to step up and agree that these sanctions are critical," Cornyn told Iran International.

"Iran is the number one state sponsor of terrorism. Thank goodness President Trump disrupted their nuclear weapons program. But their attitude and conduct remain unchanged, and these sanctions are entirely justified," the Texas senator said.

Cornyn’s push follows a letter led by Senator Jim Risch and signed by 50 Senate Republicans last week. The letter praised the UK, France, and Germany for re-activating the UN sanctions on Iran and urged sustained pressure until Tehran’s nuclear program is fully dismantled.

The move reflects growing United States concerns over Iran’s nuclear progress and its support for proxy groups across the region.

At the UN General Assembly on Wednesday, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian accused the US of betraying trust, particularly after its 2018 withdrawal from the JCPOA nuclear deal, and stressed Iran’s willingness to pursue diplomacy to resolve the crisis.

Pezeshkian denied that Iran has ever sought nuclear weapons, despite the US and Israeli assertions in June that Tehran was racing toward a bomb.

"I hereby declare once more that Iran has never sought and will never seek to build a nuclear bomb," Pezeshkian said.

Addressing European powers, Pezeshkian accused Germany, Britain, and France of acting in bad faith by reinstating UN sanctions.

"The three European states, having failed through a decade of bad faith and by supporting military aggression to subdue the proud people of Iran, at the behest of the United States, sought to reinstate terminated UN Security Council resolutions through pressure, coercion, and blatant abuse," the Iranian president said.

French President Emmanuel Macron also met with Pezeshkian on the sidelines of the UN meeting, warning that time was running out. "An agreement remains possible — only hours left; it is up to Iran," Macron posted on X.

Iran’s deputy foreign minister Kazem Gharibabadi said that in a meeting on Wednesday with the Chinese and Russian ambassadors to the UN, they agreed on coordinated action against what he called unlawful attempts by Britain, France, and Germany to reinstate sanctions on Tehran.

The broadcast featured a series of video files that reportedly contain material from inside Israeli nuclear and other sensitive facilities, including the Dimona site. It also presented alleged details about personnel working on Israel’s nuclear program.

“We identified 189 Israeli nuclear and proliferation scientists and top officials, along with their networks,” Intelligence Minister Esmaeil Khatib said during the presentation, which included names and ID cards of alleged nuclear personnel.

“I tell Netanyahu … your employees collaborated with us for money and still do,” Khatib, a cleric and veteran military and intelligence official, added.

Israel is widely believed to have an undeclared nuclear arsenal.

Tehran's nemesis killed nuclear scientists and hundreds of military personnel in a surprise 12-day military campaign in June, underscoring Iranian intelligence failures.

Iran has said it too has infiltrated its enemy, and Israel has arrested several of its citizens on charges of spying for Tehran.

One alleged employee was introduced with a photo and described as working across seven Israeli nuclear sites under the cover of a company called ROTEM.

Another was identified as a nuclear scientist allegedly involved in "proliferation projects" between Israel and the United States.

It also mentioned the Chaim Weizmann laboratory, which it described as Israel’s leading proliferation program and was targeted by Iranian ballistic missiles during a 12-day war in June.

Additional documents shown in the broadcast suggested alleged nuclear cooperation between Israel and France under a project called SARAF.

One batch of the alleged material included private and family photos of International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director General Rafael Grossi it alleged was obtained from Israeli intelligence sources.

The video, published on Tasnim’s Telegram channel, showed images of Grossi with his family at Disneyland, at home during birthdays and in gatherings with colleagues and friends.

According to the intelligence ministry, the material demonstrated that Israeli intelligence spies “on everyone,” including the IAEA chief, and that the data it had obtained proves this claim.