Rubio: Memorandum with Iran could materialize today

U.S. State Secretary Marco Rubio said on Monday that Washington will either settle on a good agreement with Tehran or advance the situation in “another way,” adding that a Memorandum of Understanding could be reached “today,” AFP reported.

He said that talks are still a “work-in-progress. We thought we might have some news last night, maybe today; I wouldn’t read too much into it. It takes a little while to hear back,” he told reporters before leaving New Delhi.

“We have what I think is a pretty solid thing on the table in terms of their ability to open up the straits, get the straits open, enter into a very real, significant, time-limited negotiation on the nuclear matters,” Rubio continued at the conclusion of his visit to India, referring to the Strait of Hormuz.

“Hopefully we can pull it off. There’s a lot of support in the Gulf, there’s a lot of support globally; every country that we’ve walked through it understands it’s not just very reasonable, but it’s the right thing for the world to get done. As the president said, he’s not in a hurry. He’s not going to make a bad deal. I mean, the president’s not going to make a bad agreement. So, let’s see what happens. We’re going to give diplomacy every chance to succeed before we explore the alternatives,” he said.

Also on Monday, Iranian Foreign Ministry’s spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei said that conclusions ‌have been reached on many topics discussed in the negotiations but that the final signature was not imminent, according to Reuters.

Baghaei reiterated that his country is ‌negotiating ⁠an end to the war, with nuclear issues deferred to a later stage in the talks.

The spokesman added that changes in the positions ⁠of U.S. officials create problems for any ⁠agreement, the report read.

Rubio: Israel can respond to Hezbollah attacks

Speaking on the consequences of a potential agreement to Lebanon, Rubio on Monday said that Israel has a right to defend itself.

“If Hezbollah is going to launch missiles or launches missiles at them, Israel has every right to respond to that,” AFP cited him as saying.

The U.S. diplomat condemned Hezbollah the previous day after the leader of the Iranian proxy group said that the Lebanese have the right to topple the government in Beirut.

Hezbollah’s “reckless call to overthrow Lebanon’s democratically elected government” is an attempt “to drag Lebanon back into chaos and destruction,” said Rubio, according to AFP.

He said that the Islamist organization’s threat will not succeed, as “the era in which a terrorist group held an entire nation hostage is coming to an end.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday that his American counterpart had “reaffirmed Israel’s right to defend itself against threats on every front, including Lebanon.”

Confrontations in Lebanon resumed in March, following the joint U.S.-Israeli war on Iran. The Israel Defense Forces have since taken control over a strip of land in Lebanon that runs along the border to dismantle the terrorist elements in the area. Despite a ceasefire settled with Beirut, clashes with Hezbollah in Southern Lebanon have persisted.