Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister and Head of the Center for Political and International Studies, Saeed Khatibzadeh, stated on Sunday that “the Americans seek to achieve their goals through diplomacy and the theater of negotiations,” as he put it.

According to Iran’s official news agency IRNA, Khatibzadeh said, “The other side has used all its military weapons against other countries, mobilized all its resources, and threatened other nations—this is not a neutral negotiation.”

Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of the international conference titled “International Law Amid Attack, Aggression, and Defense,” Khatibzadeh added, “The United States has not been ready for genuine negotiations aimed at results in any of its statements over the past few months.”

He continued, “Our people should know, truthfully, that the government exerted its utmost efforts in recent months and prior to the attacks to prevent this war and its escalation. But what happened was an illusion and distortion of perceptions by the enemies. Iran has always been prepared, so we must be careful and alert to the other side's actions and motives.

At the end of September, previously annulled UN Security Council resolutions—revoked under the 2015 nuclear agreement—were reactivated, imposing sanctions on Iran.

France, Britain, and Germany led this move, while Russia and Iran rejected its legitimacy, citing repeated violations of the nuclear deal by European countries and the U.S. withdrawal from the agreement.

These renewed restrictions include bans on supplying Iran with nuclear-related technologies and materials, prohibitions on transferring heavy weaponry and ballistic missile production technologies, and the freezing of Iranian assets abroad.