Araghchi was set to “discuss bilateral relations and regional and international developments” with Wang, Iran’s Fars news agency reported earlier.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi arrived in Beijing on Wednesday morning ahead of scheduled talks with China’s top diplomat Wang Yi, according to Iran’s Tasnim and Fars news agencies, AFP reports.
“Seyyed Abbas Araghchi arrived in Beijing… at the head of a diplomatic delegation. During this visit, our country’s Foreign Minister will discuss bilateral relations and regional and international developments with his Chinese counterpart,” Fars reported.
The US secretary of state said Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner are “working hard” to advance diplomatic efforts with Iran.
He added that Iran must “accept the reality of the situation” and come to the negotiating table, agreeing to terms that are “good for it, but ultimately good for the world.”
Marco Rubio said that ‘Project Freedom’ was “defensive in nature”, asserting that US forces would only engage militarily if attacked first. “This is not an offensive operation. This is a defensive operation,” he said, adding that there would be “no shooting unless we’re shot at first.”
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the US would continue to deploy its assets to defend freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz, reports Reuters.
He insisted the US was taking defensive action in enforcing its blockade of Iranian ports. The initial military operation against Iran was over, he said.
“We are only responding if attacked first. This is a defensive operation,” Rubio said.
He added that the United States has been in touch with a number of ships about moving out of the strait, echoing remarks made earlier by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.
Rubio said it was time for Tehran to “accept the reality of the situation”, adding that US envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner were continuing to explore a diplomatic solution.
That solution had to address any nuclear material that Iran still had buried “deep somewhere,” Rubio said.
Speaking at the Woodrow Wilson International Centre in Washington, D.C., in early 2012, Henry Kissinger asserted that, since World War II, the US had entered wars without a clear exit strategy, and often sought a way out shortly after engagement. He highlighted the Afghan conflict as an example of a prolonged and unwinnable war. At that time, the US, despite being the world’s greatest military power, was bogged down in a conflict that had entered its second decade. It took another decade for this war to conclude, resulting in utter humiliation for America, which had faced similar challenges in Vietnam and Iraq.
America’s longest war in Afghanistan was triggered by a desire for revenge for 9/11. Its military intervention in Iraq, meanwhile, was initiated under false pretenses regarding the possession by Iraq of weapons of mass destruction (WMD). From the outset, both conflicts proved unwinnable, yet deception masked the failures. For nearly two decades, American leaders misled the public about the disastrous outcomes of these wars.