Rubio Says Iran Talks Are Not Near a Breakthrough and Calls Demands Unacceptable

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on November 8 that diplomatic contacts involving Iran had made little progress and that Washington was not close to a breakthrough. Speaking to reporters at Homestead Air Reserve Base in Florida before leaving for France, he described Iranian demands as unacceptable. Rubio said several countries were continuing to engage Iran and put forward different ideas. “I have no progress to report,” he said. He said President Donald Trump preferred a diplomatic solution and that the United States would examine an opportunity to reach one. Rubio also characterized some Iranian demands as outrageous and detached from reality, without specifying the demands in the reported remarks. Asked about possible further US military action, Rubio said a response would depend on threats to American forces or shipping in the region. He said Washington had a right to defend itself against a clear and immediate threat. The level of any response, he said, would depend on the threat and on whether Iranian forces were acting, or intended to act, against US interests. Rubio also defended Trump’s decision to go to war with Iran, saying the president had confronted a threat that previous administrations had not addressed. He said an Iranian nuclear weapon would endanger Israel, the Middle East, the wider world and the United States. Rubio was departing for France to attend a meeting of G7 foreign ministers.