Iran not seeking nuclear weapons and ‘ready for dialogue’, Pezeshkian says

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian denied on Friday that Tehran sought nuclear weapons as he expressed readiness for dialogue and condemned US sanctions. “Iran is not seeking nuclear weapons, and we consider the malicious propaganda against our country to be lies,” Pezeshkian said during talks with Georgia's prime minister Irakli Kobakhidze. “We have always been ready for dialogue. They think they can force us to surrender, but we will not bow to coercion,” he added, calling US sanctions against Tehran “unjustifiable and inhumane”. In his meeting with the Georgian premier on the sidelines of a UN biodiversity summit in Armenia’s capital Yerevan, Pezeshkian also called for closer ties with Georgia, weeks after Iranian airlines stopped flying to Georgia when Tbilisi said it would comply with US sanctions on the carriers. Georgia's Civil Aviation Agency said last month it would comply with the US sanctions regime, while Kobakhidze insisted Tbilisi was not imposing its own bilateral sanctions on Tehran. Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian delivers a speech during the leaders' summit at the Convention on Biological Diversity in the Armenian capital of Yerevan, 16 October 2026 (AFP)