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European foreign ministers pushed Iran to return to direct talks with the U.S.

President Vladimir Putin of Russia said he was concerned that conflicts over Ukraine and Iran could spark World War 3.

With the threat of U.S. airstrikes, President Trump used “coercive diplomacy” to force possible Iranian nuclear concessions.

Iran’s top diplomat rejected negotiations over Tehran’s nuclear program while Israeli bombs continue to fall, making a ceasefire in the eight-day war a condition for renewed talks with the Trump administration.

Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi’s statement came a day after President Donald Trump opened a possible two-week window for talks, turning down expectations of imminent U.S. airstrikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities.

“There is no room for negotiations with the U.S. until Israeli aggression stops,” Araghchi was quoted as saying on Iranian state TV on June 20. Talks later in the day between Araghchi and his counterparts from the UK, France, Germany and the EU ended after three hours without a breakthrough. The talks, which aim to get Iran back into negotiations with the Trump administration, will continue, participants said.

Trump told reporters “two weeks would be the maximum,” time he will wait to strike a deal with Iran before greenlighting aggressive action.

While diplomats wrangled in Geneva and at the UN in New York, the airstrikes kept coming. Israel said it hit Iranian missile facilities overnight, while an Iranian missile stuck in southern Israel. Iran said June 16 that 240 people had been killed in Israeli attacks. The Human Rights Activists News Agency, a U.S.-based group focused on Iran, said more than 600 had died. At least 24 Israelis have been killed by Iranian fire.

Follow along with USA TODAY for live updates of the Israel-Iran crisis.

Trump dismisses intelligence community assessment on Iranian nuclear program again

Trump knocked down an intelligence community assessment that Iran is not building a nuclear weapon.

He told reporters after landing in New Jersey that Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard was “wrong” when she said that in testimony earlier this year to Congress.

It was the second time this week that Trump has publicly disputed the findings from the U.S. intelligence community on Iran, after telling reporters on June 17, “I don’t care what she said.”

-Francesca Chambers

Trump: Iran has 2 weeks to make a deal

President Donald Trump in his first public remarks in nearly 48 hours said Iran has a maximum of two weeks to make a deal with the United States before he approves aggressive action against the Islamic Republic.

“I’m giving them a period of time,” Trump said of Iran while speaking to reporters in New Jersey. “Two weeks would be the maximum.”

Trump said he did not understand why oil-rich Iran would need enriched uranium for civilian energy purposes and told press traveling with him that he would be willing to consider a ceasefire in the conflict.

The president said he was waiting “to see whether or not people come to their senses” and said that “Iran doesn’t want to speak to Europe, they want to speak to us,” as he dismissed U.S. allies’ Geneva talks.

The president is spending the night at his Bedminster golf club, where he’ll appear in the evening at a MAGA Inc. fundraiser. He is liable while he is there to hear from backers of his movement who are opposed to military action.

He told reporters before he boarded Marine One that he can still play peacemaker if he does decide to strike. “Sometimes you need some toughness to make peace but always a peacemaker,” he said.

-Francesca Chambers

State Department tight-lipped on conflict with Iran

State Department spokeswoman Tammy Bruce was tight-lipped at an afternoon briefing, where she was pressed for information on conversations the adminstration may be having with Iran.

She said President Trump is “not posturing” and wants a diplomatic solution. But she could not say why Trump put two-week timer on negotiations.

“He has his reasons, and he’s the one who knows, and that is the specificity of his statement, and I’ll leave it at that,” Bruce said. Trump on June 20 said he had opened a two-week window for new talks with Iran before deciding if the U.S. should join Israel’s airstrikes on Iranian uranium enrichment sites.

-Francesca Chambers

Shortage of Israeli missile interceptors could force ‘serious decisions’ on U.S.

As Israel downs incoming volleys of Iranian missiles, a shortage of its missile interceptors could put both the U.S. and Israel in a bind.

After a week of aerial war with Iran, Israel’s long-range Arrow interceptors are running low, the Wall Street Journal reported on June 18. In addition to Arrow interceptors, which are Israeli-made, Israel also has U.S.-made THAAD batteries, which intercept medium-range ballistic missiles.

If the U.S. chooses to replenish Israel’s missile interceptors, it would mean drawing from other stockpiles, since Congress wouldn’t have time to surge U.S. defense production of more, according to Brandan Buck, a research fellow at the Cato Institute.

That could include siphoning off THAAD interceptors from Ukraine, those marked off to defend Taiwan, or the U.S.’s own national stock, Buck said.

“If they truly do run out… that’s going to put us in a position in which we have to make some serious decisions,” Buck said.

-Cybele Mayes-Osterman

No breakthrough in Europe talks

The foreign Ministers of France and Germany and the High Representative of the European Union said in a statement after three hours of talks with Iran that the group “discussed avenues towards a negotiated solution to Iran’s nuclear program.”

“They expressed their view that all sides should refrain from taking steps which lead to further escalation in the region, and urgently find a negotiated solution to ensure that Iran never obtains or acquires a nuclear weapon,” the statement said.

The Europeans are trying to get Iran back negotiating with the U.S. under the shadow of President Trump’s threat to join Israel’s air war on the Iranian nuclear program.

-Francesca Chambers

UN chief warns of uncontrollable conflict

Israel’s U.N. envoy, Danny Danon, told the Security Council his country would not stop its attacks “until Iran’s nuclear threat is dismantled.” Iran’s envoy Amir Saeid Iravani called for Security Council action and said Tehran was alarmed by reports the U.S. may join the war.

The head of the U.N. nuclear watchdog used the June 20 meeting at the United Nations in New York to warn against attacks on nuclear facilities. “Armed attack on nuclear facilities… could result in radioactive releases with great consequences within and beyond the boundaries of the state which has been attacked,” International Atomic Energy Agency director Rafael Grossi said.

He spoke a day after an Israeli military official said it had been “a mistake” when a spokesperson said Israel had struck Bushehr, Iran’s only nuclear power plant. Iran said on its air defences had been activated in Bushehr, without elaborating.

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned the conflict could “ignite a fire no one can control” and called on all parties to “give peace a chance.” Russia and China demanded immediate de-escalation.

The White House said on Thursday President Donald Trump would decide on U.S. involvement in the conflict in the next two weeks. A three hour meeting on June 20 between European foreign ministers and Iran ended without apparent progress.

-Reuters

Putin says he fears World War 3

Russian President Vladimir Putin said he was worried when asked if he was concerned the world was heading towards World War Three.

Putin, speaking at an economic forum in St Petersburg on June 20, said world conflict was growing.

He mentioned Russia’s own war in Ukraine, the conflict between Israel and Iran, and said he was concerned by what was happening around nuclear facilities in Iran where Russian specialists are building two new nuclear reactors for Tehran.

“It is disturbing. I am speaking without any irony, without any jokes. Of course, there is a lot of conflict potential, it is growing, and it is right under our noses, and it affects us directly,” said Putin.

On June 18, Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said Israeli strikes on Iranian nuclear infrastructure put the world “millimeters” from catastrophe.

-Reuters

Vladimir Putin: Trump agrees to protect Russian-operated reactor in Iran

Russian leader Vladimir Putin said President Trump had agreed to ensure the Israelis don’t strike the Russian-operated Bushehr nuclear reactor in Iran.

On June 19, the Israeli military mistakenly announced that Bushehr, Iran’s only nuclear power plant, had been hit by an airstrike. The claim was later retracted, but it sent a wave of concern across the region. Bushehr is on Iran’s southern coast, not far from other Persian Gulf nations.

The head of Russia’s nuclear energy corporation warned an attack on Bushehr could lead to a “Chernobyl-style catastrophe.”

Russian reports on June 20 said both Trump and the Israeli government had agreed to safeguard the safety of Russian staff at Bushehr.

The 3,000 megawatt plant isn’t connected to Iran’s nuclear enrichment program. Spent fuel is shipped back to Russia, making it unavailable for enrichment in Iran.

-Dan Morrison

Iran says European spy arrested

Iran’s semi-official Tasnim news agency said a European posing as a tourist had been charged with espionage in northern Iran after they were caught with photos of sensitive military installations. The suspect wasn’t named. The report came as officials separately announced they had arrested “internal agents of the enemy,” and encouraged Iranians to watch out for spies.

The reported arrests came in the wake of a massive operation in which Israeli forces were able to knock out key parts of Iran’s nuclear and military infrastructure in a surprise attack on June 13, while killing top generals and nuclear scientists in targeted strikes on their homes and other locations.

Israel spent years smuggling weapons into Iran, where it established a secret base for explosive-laden drones that later savaged Iranian targets, and positioned short-range weapons near Iranian surface-to-air missile systems, according to U.S. and Israeli media reports.

Now, Iran’s Revolutionary Guards are on the hunt for enemies within who may have helped Israel prepare its devastating blow. A security official quoted by Tasnim praised the “timely reporting of suspicious activities.”

-Dan Morrison

Back to the nuke deal future?

As President Donald Trump delays a decision on bombing Iran’s nuclear sites, giving time for European nations to pursue diplomacy, two numbers loom over any future nuclear accord: 3.67% and 90%.

The first number was the level of uranium enrichment the United Nations’ nuclear watchdog verified Iran was enriching at around the time Trump, in his first term, pulled the United States out of the Obama-era nuclear deal, known as JCPOA, between Iran and world powers.

Since Trump scrapped the deal in May 2018 Iran’s enrichment level has closed in on 90%, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency. That’s the level, the IAEA and other nuclear watchdogs say, that puts Iran on the cusp of turning enriched uranium into a nuclear weapon.

The JCPOA’s critics, many of them decades-long Iran hawks such as former national security adviser John Bolton and Sens. Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio (now U.S. Secretary of State), have long pointed out that the accord did nothing to address Iran’s ballistic missile program and its regional militia proxies.

But the enrichment controls were, according to the IAEA, working. This raises questions about what kind of new deal could potentially emerge, and if it will be an improvement on what Trump abandoned in 2018.

-Kim Hjelmgaard

Europe pushes Iran to rejoin U.S. talks

European diplomats sat down with Iran’s foreign minister in a last-ditch effort to restart U.S.-Iran nuclear talks.

Presidential envoy Steve Witkoff and Secretary of State Marco Rubio met at the White House on June 19 with UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy, who is now in Geneva for the European talks with Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi.

“A window now exists within the next two weeks to achieve a diplomatic solution,” Lammy said in a post on X.

Rubio has been burning up the phones with his European counterparts, including French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot. Working with the Trump administration’s blessing, the Europeans called “for a return to the diplomatic track and to continue negotiations on Iran’s nuclear program,” the French foreign ministry said.

President Trump on June 19 opened a two-week window for talks to end Iran’s nuclear program, under the threat of the U.S. joining Israel’s airstrikes.

-Francesca Chambers

Iran says Israel sabotaged its talks with Trump administration

Iranian foreign minister Abbas Araghchi said his government was preparing a “very promising” proposal for the Trump administration in talks over its nuclear program when Israel attacked on June 13.

Araghchi on June 20 called Israel’s attacks on Iranian nuclear facilities and other targets grave war crimes, speaking at the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland, ahead of talks with European diplomats.

Iranian and U.S. negotiators were set to meet on June 15. Araghchi said Israel had betrayed diplomacy by striking before that planned round of U.S.-Iran talks.

President Trump has said repeatedly Iran should have accepted a U.S. offer. The details of Washington’s offer aren’t publicly known, except for a single condition: A complete end to nuclear enrichment, which Iran says it can’t accept.

“They had to sign a document, and I think they wished they signed it,” Trump said June 18. “It was a fair deal, and now it’s a harder thing to sign.”

Trump, weapons massed, uses ‘coercive diplomacy’

Former U.S. ambassador to Israel Daniel Shapiro said the Pentagon has for years been refining plans for strikes on Iran that President Donald Trump can tap into if he decide to give the go-ahead.

“He’s clearly ordered the forces into the theater that would support the strike if and when he makes that decision,” said Shapiro, who was deputy assistant secretary of defense for the Middle East at the end of the Biden administration.

U.S. airstrikes could also prompt retaliation. Tehran’s response could include attacks on U.S. military bases in Gulf countries or Iraq and Syria, the targeting of regional energy facilities, and blocking oil and gas shipments from crossing the Strait of Hormuz, Shapiro said.

The conflict is now in a phase of “coercive diplomacy,” where Trump is signaling that he’s preparing for military strikes, he said.

“There’s potentially one last opportunity for Iran to come to a negotiating table, whether it’s with the U.S. or through some other partners, and make the concession that they wouldn’t make in the talks that were being held before the hostility started,” Shapiro, a fellow at the Atlantic Council, told USA TODAY.

-Francesca Chambers

Explosions over Tel Aviv

For the eighth day in a row, the consussion of missile and interceptors echoed over Tel Aviv. Iranian news reports said a new fusillade of missiles had been fired toward Israel.

Israeli officials said they were working to intercept the ballistic missiles. While taking a pummeling from Israel, Iran has managed several times to pierce its enemy’s “Iron Dome” defensive shield, striking neighborhoods, hospitals and a research institute.

Hours after President Donald Trump said publicly that Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard was “wrong” in her assessment of Iran’s efforts on obtaining a nuclear weapon, Gabbard asserted on X that media outlets were unfairly sowing division between her and Trump.

“The dishonest media is intentionally taking my testimony out of context and spreading fake news as a way to manufacture division,” Gabbard said in a post to social media that highlighted video of her prior testimony on the issue on Capitol Hill.

She continued, “America has intelligence that Iran is at the point that it can produce a nuclear weapon within weeks to months, if they decide to finalize the assembly. President Trump has been clear that can’t happen, and I agree.”

What she testified: On Capitol Hill in March, Gabbard had testified that the US intelligence community “continues to assess that Iran is not building a nuclear weapon, and Supreme Leader Khamenei has not authorized the nuclear weapons program that he suspended in 2003.”

More context: CNN has previously reported that US intelligence assessed Iran was up to three years away from being able to produce and deliver a nuclear weapon to a target of its choosing, according to four people familiar with the assessment.

The International Atomic Energy Agency, a top international watchdog, said last week that Iran had amassed enough uranium enriched at levels just below weapons-grade to potentially make nine nuclear bombs, which it termed “a matter of serious concern.”

The challenge for Iran is producing not merely a crude nuclear weapon — which experts say Iran could potentially do within the space of months if it decided to — but also producing a working delivery system, which could take much longer.

An Iranian presidential official claimed on Friday that the United States holds the power to stop the ongoing conflict between Iran and Israel with a single phone call — if it chooses to act.

Speaking to CNN, presidential adviser Majid Farahani urged President Donald Trump to pressure Israel to halt its aerial bombardments, saying such action could pave the way for renewed diplomatic talks.

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“President Trump can easily stop the war by only one telephone (call) to the Israelis,” Farahani said. “Iran believes in civilian dialogue. Directly or indirectly is not important. But as long as the bombings continue, there can be no negotiations.”

Farahani’s comments came as Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi travelled to Geneva for high-level talks with European foreign ministers, even as he reiterated that no meaningful engagement with Washington was possible unless Israel first halted its attacks.

It was the first face-to-face meeting between Western and Iranian officials since the start of the conflict. Britain’s foreign secretary said after several hours of talks Friday between top European diplomats and their Iranian counterparts that the Europeans are “keen to continue ongoing discussions and negotiations with Iran.”

Foreign Secretary David Lammy said the Europeans were clear in talks in Geneva that Iran “cannot have a nuclear weapon.” German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul said that “very serious talks” were held Friday with Iran’s Abbas Araghchi. The European ministers gave few details and took no questions.

Inputs from Associated Press

Published By: Rivanshi Rakhrai Published On: Jun 21, 2025

Geneva CNN —

European negotiators are welcoming US President Donald Trump’s announcement that he will make a decision on US military action in Iran within two weeks, telling CNN it offers “breathing space” and “a diplomatic window” that could get Iran back to the negotiating table.

Speaking ahead of nuclear talks between top European and Iranian officials in Geneva, Switzerland, one Western European diplomat told CNN that “ideas” would be presented to Iran “to see if there is room for maneuver and to explore what is possible.”

The diplomat refused to be drawn on specifics but reiterated that the crux of the matter remained Iran’s controversial uranium enrichment program and that the talks would focus on “what kind of compromise would be feasible” on that issue.

But enrichment — which Iran says it needs for peaceful purposes, while also manufacturing large quantities of near-weapons-grade material — is a major sticking point, with the Trump administration vowing that any agreement with Iran would have to entirely prohibit the country from enriching any nuclear material.

For decades, Iran, which denies it intends to build a nuclear weapon, has categorically refused to give up its capabilities — instead plowing billions of dollars into refining the technology and constructing vast enrichment facilities, like the secretive Fordow installation, which is built deep underground inside a mountain.

After launching its first wave of strikes on Iran, Israel pointed to a recent report by the International Atomic Energy Agency, which acknowledged Iran is enriching uranium to a higher level than other countries without nuclear weapons programs, in violation of its nuclear non-proliferation obligations.

But after more than a week of intensive Israeli airstrikes, which has seen Iran lose large parts of its enrichment program, the Islamic Republic’s hardline calculations may eventually change, the Western European diplomat told CNN.

“Because Iran is now under immense military pressure, it might run out of options, and their nuclear capability is being degraded,” the diplomat said.

Until Trump’s decision to allow diplomacy another shot, the Geneva talks had looked like a European sideshow, with the US seemingly poised to join with Israel in the destruction of Iranian nuclear facilities.

The meeting, between the EU’s foreign policy chief, alongside the British, French and German foreign ministers and their Iranian counterpart, is now taking on greater significance, setting the stage for next steps and possibly acting as a bridge between Iran and the United States.

But there is an underlying fear in Geneva that the reinvigorated talks here, the first formal meetings with Iranian representatives since the escalation of the Israel-Iran conflict, will still go nowhere.

Even Trump’s announcement of a two-week window may be a ploy by the mercurial American president to play for time, the Western European diplomat told CNN, while US military forces are assembled and readied for the “big gamble” of a military intervention that “could inflame the region.”

“It’s impossible to read anything Trump says because there is a daily barrage of statements,” the diplomat added.

CNN —

President Donald Trump’s decision to open a two-week negotiating window before deciding on striking Iran sets off an urgent effort to restart talks that had been deadlocked when Israel began its bombing campaign last week.

The hope among Trump and his advisers is that Iran — under constant Israeli attack and having suffered losses to its missile arsenal — will relent on its hardline position and agree to terms it had previously rejected, including abandoning its enrichment of uranium, according to US officials.

The deferred decision, which came after days of increasingly martial messages from the president suggesting he was preparing to order a strike, also gives Trump more time to weigh the potential consequences — including the chance it could drag the United States into the type of foreign conflict he promised to avoid.

But negotiating a diplomatic solution in Trump’s condensed timeline appeared to face significant early hurdles.

Earlier this week, discussions were underway inside the White House to dispatch Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff and Vice President JD Vance to the region for talks with Iran. But as Trump grew wary that diplomatic efforts might succeed, the idea never resulted in scheduled talks, and both Vance and Witkoff remained in Washington as of Thursday.

Foreign ministers from Britain, Germany and France are traveling to Geneva on Friday to hold talks with Iranian representatives, and have been briefed on the details of the last deal Witkoff offered to Iran, which Tehran ultimately rejected before the Israeli strikes began. Among US officials, there were not high expectations of success for Friday’s meeting in Geneva, one US official said. But a White House official kept the door open to progress.

“This is a meeting between European leaders and Iran. The President supports diplomatic efforts from our allies that could bring Iran closer to taking his deal,” a White House official said.

Iran’s consistent message to the US since Israel began its strikes a week ago has been they will not engage in further talks with the US until the ongoing Israeli operation ends, two sources familiar with the messages said.

The US has so far not pressured Israel to halt its strikes, sources said. And Trump said this week that his message to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been to “keep going.”

So far, Iran has offered no indication it is willing to move off its positions on enrichment, which it views as a red line. And as of Thursday, no official talks between the US and Iran were on the books, US officials said.

In putting off a decision, Trump appears to be placing more stock in a diplomatic solution that only a day earlier he appeared to suggest was out of reach.

“I think the president has made it clear he always wants to pursue diplomacy. But believe me, the president is unafraid to use strength if necessary,” press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Thursday after relaying Trump’s new two-week timeline. “And Iran and the entire world should know that the United States military is the strongest and most lethal fighting force in the world, and we have capabilities that no other country on this planet possesses.”

In a string of Situation Room meetings over the course of this week, Trump has quizzed advisers about the likelihood US bunker-buster bombs could entirely eliminate Iran’s underground nuclear facility at Fordow, and how long such an operation might last, according to people familiar with the conversations.

An overhead view of the Fordow facility in Iran, on June 7, 2004. Maxar Technologies

He has insisted repeatedly he wants to avoid taking action that could devolve into a multi-year conflict, something many of his own loyalists — including his onetime top strategist Steve Bannon, with whom the president had lunch Thursday — argue would be unavoidable should he make the decision to go ahead.

And while the president has seen the military options, he remains worried about a longer-term war. Any assessments on whether a strike would cause prolonged US engagement are predictive and, by their nature, not entirely satisfactory, one official said.

The new, within-two-weeks time frame for talks was not universally welcomed. An Israeli intelligence official expressed dismay that Trump would not make a decision – one way or the other.

“This is not helping,” the official said.

Trump will continue to convene top-level intelligence briefings over the coming days, returning to Washington early from a weekend trip to his property in New Jersey to be updated at the White House.

He has relied principally on his CIA Director John Ratcliffe and Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Dan Caine in meetings to discuss his options, according to people familiar with the matter.

But at the center of the diplomatic efforts will be Witkoff, the president’s friend and foreign envoy who has led negotiations meant to curb Tehran’s nuclear ambitions. Witkoff began direct messaging with his Iranian counterpart, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, earlier this month and the administration has maintained some communications with Iranian officials over the past tense days as Trump weighed a strike.

The plan that Witkoff last offered to Tehran would have required Iran to eventually end all uranium enrichment on its soil, and on Thursday the White House said it still views a ban on Iranian uranium enrichment as necessary to a final deal.

As the Europeans head into Friday’s meeting, they will be “taking the temperature” on how receptive the Iranians are to finding a diplomatic solution, given their belief that strikes in both directions are not a solution, a European official said.

European leaders believe the risks of Iran’s nuclear program persist even amid Israel’s strikes because Tehran maintains nuclear know-how and may still have clandestine nuclear-related efforts that won’t get demolished by military strikes.

Meanwhile, most US diplomats who are not in Trump’s inner circle at the State Department have not been given specific guidance to offer US allies on the diplomatic efforts, a US official and a European diplomat said.

That has led to many frustrating discussions with foreign interlocutors as US diplomats have very few answers to give the allies as they try to determine their diplomatic and military posture in the region, pointing only to Trump’s own words.

As Trump has weighed his options, Secretary of State Rubio has been close by, also departing early from the Group of 7 summit in Canada along with the commander in chief earlier this week.

The top US diplomat spoke on Monday with his French, British and European Union counterparts about efforts to “encourage a diplomatic path that ensures Iran never develops a nuclear weapon,” according to State Department readouts of the calls.

On Wednesday, Rubio “compared notes” on the matter with the Norwegian foreign minister. Rubio met with British Foreign Secretary David Lammy on Thursday before Lammy departs for the Geneva talks, and the two “agreed Iran can never develop or acquire a nuclear weapon,” according to the State Department.

“Meeting with Secretary of State Rubio and Special Envoy to the Middle East Witkoff in the White House today, we discussed how Iran must make a deal to avoid a deepening conflict. A window now exists within the next two weeks to achieve a diplomatic solution,” Lammy said in a statement Thursday.

US officials, including Witkoff, have also been actively engaged with officials in the region, many of whom have offered their help in mediating a diplomatic path forward. Multiple sources said Iran has responded to messages from third parties, but their responses have not changed.

CNN’s Jamie Gangel contributed to this report.