Trump says Iran is Ready to Resume Talks — and ‘I’ve Agreed’

President Donald Trump says Iran’s leadership has agreed to resume negotiations with the United States following a wave of US-Israeli strikes on multiple cities in the Arab country.

According to The Atlantic, Trump said Tehran had reached out for talks and that he had accepted.

“They want to talk, and I have agreed to talk,” Trump told the newspaper’s reporter Michael Scherer in a telephone interview.

“They should have done it sooner. They should have given what was very practical and easy to do sooner. They waited too long.”

Trump added that several Iranian officials previously involved in negotiations were no longer alive.

“Most of those people are gone. Some of the people we were dealing with are gone, because that was a big — that was a big hit,” he said.

“They should’ve done it sooner. They played too cute.”

The development follows coordinated US-Israeli strikes on Iranian targets that killed Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and Abdolrahim Mousavi, Iran’s supreme leader, and armed forces chief of staff respectively.

Khamenei’s daughter, grandchild, daughter-in-law and son-in-law were also killed in the military operation.

With Khamenei’s death, Iran is said to be under transitional leadership pending the selection of a successor by the assembly of experts.

Trump did not disclose who is directly overseeing the alleged renewed outreach to Washington .

Iranian authorities have declared a national mourning period, while senior revolutionary guard commanders and other defence officials were also reported killed in the attacks.

The conflict has resulted in significant casualties. Iranian officials and regional monitors estimate that more than 200 people have been killed and over 700 injured since the strikes began.

In Israel, authorities say at least nine people have been killed in retaliatory missile and drone attacks launched by Iran, with more than 100 others injured.