LONDON: Tehran would have “no choice” but to retaliate if the US decided to join Israel in attacking Iran, Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Majid Takht Ravanchi has told CNN.

Ravanchi told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour: “If the Americans decide to get involved militarily, we have no choice but to retaliate. That is clear and simple because we are acting in self-defense.”

Ravanchi took part in the interview on the sixth day of conflict between his country and Israel. 

Iran had been set to participate in a new round of talks on the nuclear issue with the US last Sunday, until Israel launched its attacks on Friday.

Ravanchi said that his country’s leadership doubted “the sincerity of the Americans” given the timing of Israel’s first attack.

He added: “Two days before the next round (of talks) started, the aggression took place. So, this is a betrayal of diplomacy; this is the betrayal of our trust of Americans.

“We should be the ones who should criticize the way that we were treated by the Americans, not vice versa.”

When I asked Deputy Foreign Minister @TakhtRavanchi whether Iran is on the verge of making a nuclear bomb, he repeated what his government has said for decades: “We do not believe in nuclear weapons. Nuclear weapons have no place in our defensive doctrine.” pic.twitter.com/WqXS3TUp5f

— Christiane Amanpour (@amanpour) June 18, 2025

The deputy foreign minister said: “The Americans have been collaborating with the Israelis. Although they have said that they do not have anything to do with this conflict, it is not true. But if they decide to be engaged militarily, direct military involvement in this massacre, definitely we will do whatever necessary to protect ourselves.

“They (the Israelis) attacked residential areas, they attacked paramedics, they attacked citizens who were just sleeping in their homes. This is a crime against humanity, pure and simple.”

Israel’s targeting of Iran’s nuclear facilities was also a crime, he said, adding: “Fordow is another protected site based on IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency) rules.

“So, that will be another instance of a crime which is being done, unfortunately by Israelis and Americans, which is prohibited under international law.”

He said: “These are safeguarded places. It is a crime in accordance with international law to attack a place which is safeguarded under IAEA rules. Unfortunately, the Americans and some Europeans have shielded the Israeli regime, (and it is) not to be criticized at the IAEA board of governors’ meeting and also at the UN Security Council. So it’s shame on all those who are protecting this regime.”

Ravanchi said that Tehran had not asked the US or Israel to resume nuclear talks since hostilities began, refuting US President Donald Trump’s earlier claim that Tehran had reached out to the White House.

He said: “We are not reaching out to anybody. We are defending ourselves. Although we have always promoted diplomacy … we cannot negotiate under threat. We cannot negotiate while our people are under bombardment every day. So we are not begging for anything; we are just defending ourselves.”

Watch out for my exclusive interview with Iran Dep. FM @TakhtRavanchi from Tehran - really hard to reach. He tells me Iran will not surrender, will retaliate if the US gets involved... but is also ready to get back to negotiations once this ends. Watch it all: 1pET/6pBST. pic.twitter.com/52W5OqPLVQ

— Christiane Amanpour (@amanpour) June 18, 2025

He claimed that the attacks had mobilized support for the government among Iranians, adding: “Now there is a very strong cohesion within Iranian society to resist aggression, to resist foreign interference in our domestic affairs.

“Ask the people who are in Tehran. You will understand that the Iranians are behind their government because they are facing a foreign aggression which will be resisted.”

Israeli officials have been urging Iranians to rise up against their government, arguing that now is the time for regime change with leaders in Tehran “weakened” by the attacks.

The Israeli strikes came as a result of increased tensions following the release of an IAEA report showing that Tehran had accelerated its uranium enrichment to 60 percent.

Ravanchi said: “IAEA inspectors were present in Iran. Different reports of the IAEA testify to the fact that we have been very straightforward in our nuclear program.

“There is no ban on 60 percent enriched uranium, which is being used in different places for peaceful purposes.”

He reiterated that Iran does not have nuclear weapons and does not intend to create them, adding: “Nuclear weapons have no place in our defensive doctrine. In fact, we believe that the world will be a better place without nuclear weapons.

“But who has the nuclear weapons in the Middle East? The Israeli regime. Who has the weapons, the most sophisticated weapons? The Americans. So, they are the ones who are responsible for all the chaos that is going on in different parts of the world.”

DUBAI: Israel has attacked Iran’s Arak heavy water reactor, Iranian state television said Thursday.

The report said there was “no radiation danger whatsoever” and that the facility had already been evacuated before the attack.

Israel had warned earlier it would attack the facility and urged the public to flee the area. The warning came in a social media post on X. It included a satellite image of the plant in a red circle like other warnings that preceded strikes.

The Israeli military said Thursday’s round of airstrikes targeted Tehran and other areas of Iran, without elaborating. It later said Iran fired a new salvo of missiles at Israel and told the public to take shelter.

A military spokesperson later said Israeli forces struck nuclear sites in Bushehr, Isfahan and Natanz, and continue to target additional facilities. Bushehr is Iran’s only operating nuclear power plant, which sits on the Gulf coast.

An Israeli military official said on Thursday that “it was a mistake” for a military spokesperson to have said earlier in the day that Israel had struck the Bushehr nuclear site in Iran.

The official would only confirm that Israel had hit the Natanz, Isfahan and Arak nuclear sites in Iran.

Pressed further on Bushehr, the official said he could neither confirm or deny that Israel had struck the location, where Iran has a reactor.

Hitting Bushehr, which is close to Gulf Arab neighbors and staffed in part by Russian experts, would have been a major escalation.

Israel’s seventh day of airstrikes on Iran came a day after Iran’s supreme leader rejected US calls for surrender and warned that any military involvement by the Americans would cause “irreparable damage to them.” Israel also lifted some restrictions on daily life, suggesting the missile threat from Iran on its territory was easing.

Already, Israel’s campaign has targeted Iran’s enrichment site at Natanz, centrifuge workshops around Tehran and a nuclear site in Isfahan. Its strikes have also killed top generals and nuclear scientists.

A Washington-based Iranian human rights group said at least 639 people, including 263 civilians, have been killed in Iran and more than 1,300 wounded. In retaliation, Iran has fired some 400 missiles and hundreds of drones, killing at least 24 people in Israel and wounding hundreds. Some have hit apartment buildings in central Israel, causing heavy damage.

The Arak heavy water reactor is 250 kilometers southwest of Tehran.

Heavy water helps cool nuclear reactors, but it produces plutonium as a byproduct that can potentially be used in nuclear weapons. That would provide Iran another path to the bomb beyond enriched uranium, should it choose to pursue the weapon.

Iran had agreed under its 2015 nuclear deal with world powers to redesign the facility to relieve proliferation concerns.

In 2019, Iran started up the heavy water reactor’s secondary circuit, which at the time did not violate Tehran’s 2015 nuclear deal with world powers.

Britain at the time was helping Iran redesign the Arak reactor to limit the amount of plutonium it produces, stepping in for the US, which had withdrawn from the project after President Donald Trump’s decision in 2018 to unilaterally withdraw America from the nuclear deal.

The International Atomic Energy Agency, the United Nations’ nuclear watchdog, has been urging Israel not to strike Iranian nuclear sites. IAEA inspectors reportedly last visited Arak on May 14.

Due to restrictions Iran imposed on inspectors, the IAEA has said it lost “continuity of knowledge” about Iran’s heavy water production — meaning it could not absolutely verify Tehran’s production and stockpile.

As part of negotiations around the 2015 deal, Iran agreed to sell off its heavy water to the West to remain in compliance with the accord’s terms. Even the US purchased some 32 tons of heavy water for over $8 million in one deal. That was one issue that drew criticism from opponents to the deal.