US 'totally stupid' to attack Iran during talks: UN ambassador

The United States made a "totally stupid decision" to attack Iran while in negotiations, and betrayed Gulf nations by trashing their diplomatic efforts, Tehran's UN ambassador said Tuesday.

Ali Bahreini, Iran's ambassador in Geneva, insisted Tehran had no problem with its neighbours, but could not let US bases in the Gulf be used as launchpads for attacks on Iran.

"War was not our option. War was imposed on Iran," Bahreini told UN correspondents.

"Nobody should expect Iran to show restraint in front of aggression. We will continue our defence until the point that this aggression is stopped," he said.

On 26 February, Washington and Tehran held indirect negotiations in Geneva on Iran's nuclear programme -- with the Omani mediators reporting "significant progress".

Bahreini was present for part of those talks and said "everybody was optimistic" and the US team "agreed to continue negotiations" in Vienna this week.

But Bahreini said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had convinced US President Donald Trump to destroy diplomacy and attack Iran, with strikes starting on Saturday.

"It was a totally stupid decision. They will know in the future how stupid this decision has been. Both of them will understand, because Iran will firmly determine the situation and the destiny of this war," he said.

"All our neighbours are now disappointed with the betrayal of the United States because everybody was working for diplomacy, particularly Oman.

"The US betrayed everybody."

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'Not a regional war'

Tehran has launched strikes against countries in the region that host US bases.

"I cannot accept labelling what we are doing as reprisal. What we are doing is a kind of self-defence," said Bahreini.

The ambassador said Iran's problem was not with its neighbours, describing the Gulf countries as friends.

"We are in daily dialogue with our neighbours to convey to them the message that this war is not a war against our neighbours. This is not a regional war. But we cannot ignore the fact that the US bases in their lands are operational against us. In no way we can allow those bases to be used to make military operations against Iran," he said.

He said Iran's operations were "exclusively" against US military targets, and said "there has been very serious order given to our military forces not to make any harm to civilians".

Trump claimed Tuesday that the Iranian leadership "want to talk" but Bahreini insisted no approach had been made to Washington, saying "there hasn't been any contact from our side" since the war erupted.