• Tensions escalated after anti-government protests in Iran.
• Meeting moved to Oman as Iran demands bilateral talks.
• Iran wants talks to focus only on its nuclear programme.
  

The United States and Iran are due to hold talks in Oman on Friday after Tehran requested a change of venue to limit negotiations to its nuclear programme, a regional official said, with a build-up of US forces in the Middle East raising fears of a confrontation.

Iran wanted the meeting to take place in Oman as a continuation of previous rounds of talks held in the Gulf Arab country on its nuclear programme, asking for a change of location from Turkiye to avoid any expansion of the discussions to issues such as Tehran’s ballistic missiles, the regional official said.

Iran has said it will not make concessions on its formidable ballistic missile programme — one of the biggest in the Middle East — calling that a red line in negotiations.

Tehran, which says it replenished its stockpile of ballistic missiles since coming under attack from Israel last year, has warned that it will unleash its missiles to defend the itself if its security is under threat.

The regional official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Iran had since the beginning stressed that it would only discuss its nuclear programme, while Washington wanted other issues on the agenda.

Oil prices extended gains on Wednesday after the US shot down an Iranian drone and armed Iranian boats approached a US-flagged vessel in the Strait of Hormuz, rekindling fears of an escalation between Washington and Tehran.

Iran sought bilateral talks

US President Donald Trump has warned that “bad things” would probably happen if a deal could not be reached, ratcheting up pressure on Iran in a standoff that has led to mutual threats of air strikes and stirred fears of a wider war.

On Tuesday, the US military shot down an Iranian drone that “aggressively” approached the Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier in the Arabian Sea, the US military said, in an incident first reported by Reuters.

Trump told reporters at the White House on Tuesday: “We are negotiating with them right now.” He did not elaborate and declined to say where he expected talks to take place.

A source familiar with the situation said Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, was due to take part in the talks, along with US Special Envoy Steve Witkoff and Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi.

Ministers from several other countries in the region including Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates had also been expected to attend, but a regional source told Reuters that Tehran wanted only bilateral talks with the US.

In June, the United States struck Iranian nuclear targets, joining in at the close of a 12-day Israeli bombing campaign.

More recently, the US navy built up forces in the region following protests against the government in Iran, the deadliest since the 1979 revolution.

Trump, who stopped short of carrying out threats to intervene, has since demanded nuclear concessions from Iran, sending a flotilla to its coast.

Iran’s leadership is increasingly worried a US strike could break its grip on power by driving an already enraged public back onto the streets, according to six current and former Iranian officials.

The priority of the diplomatic effort is to avoid conflict and de-escalate tension, a regional official told Reuters earlier.

Tanker incident

Iranian sources told Reuters last week that Trump had demanded three conditions for the resumption of talks: zero enrichment of uranium in Iran, limits on Tehran’s ballistic missile programme and an end to its support for regional proxies.

Iran has long said all three demands are unacceptable infringements of its sovereignty, but two Iranian officials told Reuters its rulers saw the ballistic missile programme, rather than uranium enrichment, as the bigger obstacle.

An Iranian official said there should not be preconditions for talks and that Iran was ready to show flexibility on uranium enrichment, which it says is for peaceful, not military purposes.

Since the US strikes in June, Tehran has said its uranium enrichment work has stopped.

In another incident on Tuesday, this one in the Strait of Hormuz, the US Central Command said Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps forces had approached a US-flagged tanker at speed and threatened to board and seize it.

Maritime risk management group Vanguard said the Iranian boats ordered the tanker to stop its engine and prepare to be boarded. Instead, the tanker sped up and continued its voyage.

Women in Iran can now formally obtain a licence to ride a motorcycle, local media reported Wednesday, ending years of legal ambiguity surrounding two-wheelers.

The law previously did not explicitly prohibit women from riding motorbikes and scooters, but in practice, authorities refused to issue licences.

Due to the legal grey area, women have been held legally responsible for accidents even when victims.

Iran’s First Vice President Mohammad Reza Aref signed a resolution on Tuesday aimed at clarifying the traffic code, which was approved by Iran’s cabinet in late January, the country’s Ilna news agency reported.

The resolution obliges traffic police to “provide practical training to female applicants, organise an exam under the direct supervision of the police, and issue motorcycle driver’s licences to women”, Ilna said.

The change follows a wave of protests across Iran that were initially sparked by economic grievances but which grew last month into nationwide anti-government demonstrations.

Tehran has acknowledged that more than 3,000 deaths occurred during the unrest, insisting that most were members of the security forces and bystanders.

Since Iran’s 1979 revolution, women have faced a number of societal restrictions, with dress codes posing a challenge for those riding motorcycles.

Women must cover their hair with a headscarf in public and wear modest, loose-fitting clothing, but in recent years, many have defied those rules, with the number of women on motorbikes rising sharply in recent months.

This trend accelerated after the 2022 death in custody of Mahsa Amini, a young Iranian woman arrested for allegedly violating the dress code.

Her death sparked protests across Iran by women demanding greater freedoms.

Japan warned of possible avalanches in the country’s northern regions on Wednesday as the mercury suddenly rose after two weeks of extreme snowfall that paralysed traffic and collapsed houses.

Sustained snow since late January has buried northern communities like Aomori under drifts of around two metres (six feet) that left residents struggling to leave home and forced schools and businesses to close.

But the temperature rose Wednesday, reaching 8°C in Aomori, increasing the risk of chunks of heavy, wet snow dropping from rooftops, potentially causing injuries and even death, officials said.

“We ask affected residents to be careful and stay mindful of falling snow and avalanches,” Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary Masanao Ozaki said at a press briefing.

By Wednesday, extreme snowfall had killed 35 people and caused 393 injuries across the country since January 20, according to the Fire and Disaster Management Agency.

Many of the cases involve mounds of snow falling on residents from houses or people tumbling from their roofs while trying to clear it.

Aomori’s accumulated snow on the ground fell below 1.6 metres on Wednesday for the first time in four days, but traffic chaos continued, according to local broadcaster ATV.

Television images showed residents walking along narrow paths carved between massive walls of snow, standing twice as high as people.

In the Niigata region, facing the Sea of Japan, a man was found dead on Tuesday at his collapsed house under heavy snow, while another man died after his garage caved in, Fuji Television said.

The government has deployed troops to help clear huge drifts in northern regions.

Weather forecasters warn that cold weather will return from the weekend and bring further snow to northern cities.