• Trump has said Khamenei ‘should be very worried.’
• US wants missiles, proxies, rights issues included.
• Fears grow that failed talks could spark wider war.

The White House said on Thursday that diplomacy is President Donald Trump’s first choice for dealing with Iran and he will wait to see whether a deal can be struck at high-stakes talks, but also warned that he has military options at his disposal.

Final preparations were underway for Friday’s meeting in Oman amid heightened tensions as the US builds up forces in the Middle East, which Trump has called a massive “armada,” and regional players seek to avert what many fear could escalate into a wider war.

The talks were set to go ahead even though the two sides have had differences over the agenda, and that has increased doubts about the prospects for a deal. Trump has threatened to carry out strikes on Iran if an agreement cannot be reached.

The US previously said it wanted the discussions to include Iran’s missile arsenal and other issues, while Tehran has insisted on focusing exclusively on its disputed nuclear program. It was unclear whether that disagreement had been resolved.

“The president’s diplomacy is always his first option when it comes to dealing with countries all around the world, whether it’s our allies or our adversaries,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters when asked about the coming talks.

She reiterated Trump’s position that “zero nuclear capability is something he’s been very explicit about” in his demands for Iran.

“He wants to see if a deal can be struck,” Leavitt said. “And while these negotiations are taking place, I would remind the Iranian regime that the president has many options at his disposal, aside from diplomacy, as the commander in chief of the most powerful military in the history of the world.”

Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi departed for Oman on Thursday. His spokesperson Esmail Baghaei said Tehran would engage “with authority and to reach a fair, mutually acceptable and dignified understanding on the nuclear issue.”

“We hope the American side will also participate in this process with responsibility, realism and seriousness,” Baghaei added.

Araqchi is expected to meet in Muscat with Steve Witkoff, Trump’s special envoy, and Jared Kushner, the president’s son-in-law and adviser.

On the eve of the talks, Iran’s state-run Press TV said “one of the country’s most advanced long-range ballistic missile(s),” the Khorramshahr 4, has been deployed at one of the Revolutionary Guards’ underground missile sites. The missile has a range of 2,000 km (1,240 miles) and is capable of carrying a 1,500-kg (3,300-pound) warhead, it added.

The US has pressed Iran to accept a much more limited range for its missiles.

Mutual threats

Trump’s blunt warnings and Iran’s vows of counter-strikes have spurred regional governments’ efforts to calm the situation.

Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan said his government was working hard to prevent US-Iran tensions from tipping the Middle East into a new conflict. He has spent years cultivating a close relationship with Trump while expanding Ankara’s diplomatic influence across the region.

Speaking to reporters on a return flight from a visit to Egypt, Erdogan added that talks at the level of the US and Iranian leadership would be helpful after lower-level nuclear negotiations due in Oman on Friday, according to a transcript of his comments shared by his office on Thursday.

Tensions ratcheted up this week amid uncertainty over the location and format for the talks, which will follow Tehran’s bloody crackdown on street protests last month.

Asked on Wednesday whether Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei should be worried, Trump told NBC News: “I would say he should be very worried. Yeah, he should be.”

After Trump spoke, US and Iranian officials said the two sides had agreed to shift the talks’ location to Muscat after initially accepting Istanbul.

At a press conference in Doha, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said on Thursday that “great concern” had been expressed about potential escalation in the conflict with Iran during his meetings with officials in a visit to the Gulf region. He urged Iran to end what he called aggression and help bring stability to the region.

Gulf Arab states fear that Iran will carry out its threat to target US bases on their territory if the United States attacks the Islamic Republic.

China, meanwhile, said it supported Iran’s legitimate right to the peaceful use of nuclear energy and opposed the “threat of force and sanction pressure.”

‘Bad things will happen’

Iran has said the talks must be confined to its long-running nuclear dispute with Western powers.

But US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Wednesday that talks would have to include the range of Iran’s ballistic missiles, its support for armed proxy groups around the Middle East and its treatment of its own people, besides nuclear issues. Iranian sources say the US is demanding Tehran limit the range of Iran’s missiles to 500 km (310 miles).

Tehran’s regional sway has been weakened by Israel’s attacks on its proxies – from Hamas in Gaza to Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Houthis in Yemen and militias in Iraq – and by the ousting of Iran’s close ally, former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

Iran says its nuclear activities are meant for peaceful, not military purposes, while the US and Israel have accused it of past efforts to develop nuclear weapons.

The US has sent thousands of troops to the Middle East, as well as an aircraft carrier, other warships, fighter jets, spy planes and air-refuelling tankers.

Trump has warned that “bad things” would probably happen if a deal could not be reached.

RIYADH: Saudi Arabia will start issuing Hajj visas to intending pilgrims worldwide from February 8, the Ministry of Hajj and Umrah confirmed on Thursday.

According to Saudi Gazette, the early launch is part of an accelerated timeline designed to enhance service readiness and ensure the comfort of pilgrims approximately four months ahead of the rituals, in alignment with the Kingdom’s Vision 2030.

“Contracts covering 100% of services at the holy sites for pilgrims arriving from abroad have been finalised, along with all accommodation contracts in Makkah through the Nusk platform,” confirmed the ministry.

750,000 pilgrims have registered so far, with packages booked for 30,000 pilgrims directly from their home countries, it added.

The ministry further said that approximately 485 camps have been allocated for international pilgrims at the holy sites, and 73 Hajj affairs offices have completed their basic contractual arrangements. 

In Pakistan, registration completed for 119,000 government pilgrims and 60,000 private pilgrims, confirmed Federal Minister for Religious Affairs Sardar Muhammad Yousaf last month.

He had said that Hajj preparations were underway according to the Saudi timeline. The minister had said that arrangements for food, transportation and other services were finalised through a competitive process.

During Hajj 2025, the minister had said refunds amounting to Rs3.5 billion were returned to 75% of Pakistani pilgrims, with individual refunds ranging from Rs12,000 to Rs110,000. 

He had added that training sessions with audio-visual facilities were conducted at 147 locations nationwide, and well-trained pilgrims displayed discipline during Hajj.

• Steve Witkoff, Abbas Araghchi to lead delegations at talks.
• Talks to focus on nuclear programme, missiles: New York Times.
• US maintains military option while pursuing diplomatic solution.

Iran and the United States were preparing for talks on Friday in Oman, with Washington looking to see if there is any prospect of diplomatic progress on the Iranian nuclear programme and other issues while refusing to rule out military action.

The talks, which were finally confirmed by both sides late Wednesday after hours of doubt over the location, timing and format, will be the first such encounter between the two foes since the US joined Israel’s war against the Islamic republic in June with strikes on nuclear sites.

President Donald Trump’s Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff and Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi are due to lead their delegations at the talks in the discreet Gulf sultanate, which has periodically acted as a low-profile mediator between the countries.

The meeting comes just under a month after the peak of a wave of protests nationwide in Iran against the Iranian leadership that has left thousands dead.

“They’re negotiating,” Trump said at the National Prayer Breakfast. “They don’t want us to hit them, we have a big fleet going there,” he added, referring to the aircraft carrier group he has repeatedly called an “armada”.

Trump initially threatened military action against Tehran over its crackdown on protesters and even told demonstrators, “help is on its way”. But his rhetoric in recent days has focused on reining in the Iranian nuclear programme that the West fears is aimed at making a bomb.

“He (Trump) is going to do is he is going to keep his options open, he is going to talk to everybody, he is going to try to accomplish what he can through non-military means and if he feels like the military is the only option then he is ultimately going to choose that option,” US Vice President JD Vance told SiriusXM in an interview broadcast Wednesday.

Vance also expressed frustration with the fact that Trump could not deal directly with Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, saying, “it’s a very weird country to conduct diplomacy with when you can’t even talk to the person who’s in charge of the country”.

‘Inflexibility towards US demands’

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, speaking in the Qatari capital Doha, urged Iran’s leadership to “truly enter talks”, saying there was a “great fear of military escalation in the region”.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was quoted by Turkish newspapers as saying that “so far, I see that the parties want to make room for diplomacy”, adding that conflict was “not the solution”.

There had been tensions in the run up to the talks over whether the meeting should also include regional countries and address Tehran´s support of proxies and ballistic missile programmes, two US concerns that Iran resisted.

Citing unnamed Iranian officials, the New York Times said the United States agreed the talks would exclude regional actors, and while the meeting would focus on the nuclear file it would also discuss missiles, “with the goal of coming up with a framework for a deal”.

“Iran continues to show inflexibility towards addressing US demands, which reduces the likelihood that Iran and the United States will be able to reach a diplomatic solution,” the US-based Institute for the Study of War said.

‘Compromise or war’

With the American threats of military action still looming, the United States has manoeuvred a naval group led by aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln into the region while Iran has repeatedly vowed it will hit back at US bases in the region if attacked.

“We are ready to defend and it is the US president who must choose between compromise or war,” state television on Thursday quoted army spokesman General Mohammad Akraminia as saying, warning that Iran had “easy” access to US bases.

In a sign of the tensions, Iran’s Revolutionary Guards have seized two oil tankers with their foreign crews in Gulf waters for “smuggling fuel”, the Tasnim news agency reported Thursday.

It was not immediately clear what flags the tankers were carrying nor the nationalities of the crew.

“Iran is fully prepared to stand against any foreign threat and enemy,” said former foreign minister Ali Akbar Velayati, who remains an advisor to Khamenei, quoted by the ISNA agency.