Netanyahu to Confer with US Envoy Witkoff on Iran Nuclear Talks

Diplomatic Efforts on Iran Nuclear Issue

By Emily Rose

Key Participants in the Meeting

JERUSALEM, Feb 3 (Reuters) - Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was scheduled to meet U.S. Special Envoy Steve Witkoff on Tuesday amid efforts to revive diplomacy over a long-running dispute about Iran's nuclear programme.

Iran's Response to US Demands

The meeting was scheduled for 1430 GMT and would include the director of Israel's Mossad spy agency David Barnea, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz, and Israeli Military Chief of Staff Eyal Zamir, two Israeli officials told Reuters.

Rising Tensions in the Region

Iranian sources told Reuters last week that Trump had set three conditions for resumption of talks: Zero enrichment of uranium in Iran; limits on Tehran's ballistic missile programme; and ending its support for regional proxies, which align with longstanding Israeli demands.

Iran has long said all three demands are unacceptable infringements of its sovereignty, but two Iranian officials told Reuters its clerical rulers saw the ballistic missile programme, rather than uranium enrichment, as the bigger obstacle.

Iran and the United States will resume nuclear talks on Friday in Turkey and U.S. President Donald Trump has warned that with U.S. warships heading to Iran, bad things would probably happen if a deal could not be reached.

Tensions between Tehran and Washington are running high and the arrival of a U.S. aircraft carrier and supporting warships in the Middle East has expanded Trump's ability to take military action if he so wishes, after repeatedly threatening intervention over Iran's bloody crackdown.

During the early January protests, witnesses and rights groups said, security forces crushed demonstrations with lethal force, leaving thousands dead and many wounded. Tehran blamed the violence on "armed terrorists" linked to Israel and the U.S.

(Reporting by Emily Rose; Editing by David Holmes)