Kremlin says Putin received senior advisor to Iran’s supreme leader

ISTANBUL

The Kremlin on Sunday said that Russian President Vladimir Putin had received Ali Larijani, a senior adviser to Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, in Moscow.

On the instructions of his country’s leadership, Larijani “conveyed his assessment of the worsening situation in the Middle East and around the Iranian nuclear program,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told journalists.

Peskov said that the Russian side expressed “well-known positions aimed at stabilizing the situation in the region and politically resolving issues related to the Iranian nuclear program.”

A later statement by the Kremlin provided no additional details on the meeting, while Iranian authorities have not immediately commented on Peskov's remarks.

The spokesman's statement came after Iranian state broadcaster Press TV reported Sunday that Tehran and the E3 – the UK, France, and Germany – had agreed to resume nuclear negotiations next week, citing a source.

Nuclear talks between Tehran and the US were being held through Omani mediators until Israel’s surprise attack on Iran on June 13, which triggered a 12-day war. The attack came just two days before a planned sixth round of negotiations in Muscat.

Iran accused the US of complicity in the Israeli attack, which killed top Iranian military officials, nuclear scientists, and civilians. The US also launched strikes on three major Iranian nuclear sites, claiming to have obliterated them. A ceasefire took effect on June 24.

After a joint teleconference with his E3 and EU counterparts, Iran's Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said Thursday that it was the US that withdrew from the 2015 nuclear deal and that any new round of talks is only possible “when the other side is ready for a fair, balanced, and mutually beneficial nuclear deal.”

“If EU/E3 want to have a role, they should act responsibly, and put aside the worn-out policies of threat and pressure, including the 'snap-back' for which they lack absolutely no moral and legal ground,” he wrote on X.

On Tuesday, French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot told reporters in Brussels that the E3 will restore "snap-back" sanctions on Iran by the end of August if there is no progress in nuclear talks.