Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei warned on Tuesday that the country had the ability to sink a US warship deployed to the Gulf, as fresh talks between the two sides concluded in Switzerland.
The threat by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei follows a military build-up by the United States in the region as President Donald Trump piles pressure on Iran to make a deal over its nuclear programme.
The Omani-mediated talks were aimed at averting the possibility of US military action, while Tehran is demanding the lifting of US sanctions that are crippling its economy.
An AFP journalist saw the delegations of both countries leave the location of the talks at the residence of the Omani ambassador on Tuesday afternoon.
Trump had warned of consequences ahead of the talks should Tehran fail to strike a deal.
He has repeatedly threatened to intervene militarily, first over Iran’s deadly crackdown on protesters last month and then more recently over its nuclear programme.
Washington has ordered two aircraft carriers to the region, with the first, the USS Abraham Lincoln, with nearly 80 aircraft, positioned about 700 kilometres (435 miles) from the Iranian coast as of Sunday, satellite images showed.
