Trump meets Qatar PM as Rubio reports no Iran talks progress

Summary

Trump met Qatar's prime minister at the White House on Monday, but Secretary of State Marco Rubio reported no progress in the Iran talks, so Washington is pursuing negotiations and new pressure at the same time.⁠12

Task Force Iron Gate, which the US says is now in full force, extends the blockade of Iran to land transit routes, and Tehran has called the operation doomed to fail.⁠34

Trump told CNN a renewed attack is "highly unlikely" if talks advance, yet Iran's foreign minister said negotiations have stalled since the US midterm elections, and Trump has said the US would not strike Iran again if a peace deal is reached.⁠56

Tehran says it will not negotiate unless Washington meets seven conditions set out in a June interim agreement, and it has defended a two-day proposal for restarting talks.⁠78

In Ukraine, a drone strike on a nuclear power plant killed a worker, the International Atomic Energy Agency said.⁠9

In Paraguay, the collapse of Ueno Bank, the country's largest digital bank, has left about 3 million clients without access to their accounts.⁠10

For the United States and Iran, the next test is Trump's stated expectation of meeting Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin at next week's APEC summit in China, where he says the Iran war and denuclearisation will be discussed.⁠11