Iran's President Masoud Pezeshkian on Monday questioned the United States' sincerity in seeking negotiations with Tehran as crowds of people, many chanting "Death to America", rallied across the country to mark the anniversary of the 1979 Islamic Revolution, APA reports citing Reuters.
U.S. President Donald Trump last week restored his "maximum pressure" campaign on Iran that includes efforts to drive its oil exports down to zero in order to stop Tehran from obtaining a nuclear weapon.
Trump said however that he would like to have a verified nuclear peace agreement with Tehran and expressed a willingness to talk to Pezeshkian, who said last week it would be easy to verify Iran was not developing atomic weapons.
Pezeshkian, in a televised speech at Tehran's Azadi (Freedom) Square on Monday, adopted a harsh tone: "If the U.S. were sincere about negotiations, why did they sanction us?"
On Friday, Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said that talks with the U.S. were "not smart, wise, or honorable", but he stopped short of renewing a ban on direct talks with Washington decreed during the first Trump administration in 2018.
During his previous term in office in 2018, Trump ditched Tehran's 2015 nuclear pact with world powers and reimposed sanctions that have crippled Iran's economy.
Iran's currency fell on Monday to an all-time low of 932,500 to the dollar on the unofficial market compared with 869,500 rials on Friday, according to the foreign exchange website alanchand.com.
Last month, U.N. nuclear watchdog chief Rafael Grossi told Reuters that Iran is "pressing the gas pedal" on its enrichment of uranium to near weapons grade. Iran, which has breached the 2015 pact's nuclear curbs, has long said its nuclear programme is entirely peaceful.
"No country negotiates under pressure and coercion unless it intends to surrender, especially when we remember a history of unfulfilled promises from Washington," Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi told state TV.
