Iran denies US talks despite Trump saying a deal is taking shape

After President Trump said the United States and Iran would hold new talks today, Tehran is pushing back, saying there are no direct negotiations with Washington underway

In his weekly news conference earlier this morning, Iran's foreign ministry spokesperson said, quote, we are not negotiating with the United States at this time

He said Iran is holding talks with Oman about the Strait of Hormuz, but added that under no circumstances will the waterway return to its pre-war status

That directly contradicts what President Trump said Sunday night after announcing he had called off new strikes because he believes the two sides are closing in on what he called the perimeters of a deal, including reopening shipping through the Strait of Hormuz

I was asked to by Saudi Arabia, by UAE, by Qatar, and by Iran

We were all set to go just about at this time right now, and it would have been a massive attack

We were all set to go, but when the Allies ask to call it off, they got to sort of say, well, let's see

And the reason they asked is I think there's a deal. is a deal on hormones, and then it will be a deal on the nuclear

or you might call it the denuclearization of Iran. Meanwhile CNN reports U Central Command has asked troops for new creative and unconventional ways to pressure and punish Iran even as the White House says it is giving diplomacy more time Arizona Democratic Senator Mark Kelly

a member of the Armed Services and Intelligence Committees, says the administration has no clear strategy

Well, I don't think it's the president's vision. Here's a guy who got us into this without a strategic goal

without a plan, without a timeline. He's got a secretary of defense that doesn't know how to manage this war

who decided a good metric at the beginning was just to drop as many munitions as he could on as many targets

And now we've got a munitions shortage. Big surprise. So they're flailing. They're stuck. They're responsible for this

And the president is the one that has to try to figure out a way out of this

Kelly also voiced concerns about the Pentagon's request for $67 billion to fund the war

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