Trump Stepping Up Pressure on Iran Fuels Fears of Wider Conflict

Donald Trump said he wants a “real end” to the nuclear dispute with Iran, rather than just a ceasefire in the conflict with Israel. The US president left the door open to further talks with the regime in Tehran, including possibly sending a high-level official like Special Envoy Steven Witkoff or Vice President JD Vance.

As Trump left the Group of Seven meeting in Canada early to focus on the conflict, the United Nations nuclear watchdog said new satellite imagery suggests underground uranium-enrichment facilities at Iran’s primary nuclear-fuel production site at Natanz have been damaged. The International Atomic Energy Agency has yet to detect damage at Iran’s other underground enrichment site in Fordow, it said today.

Chinese president Xi Jinping said China is “deeply worried” about the worsening Middle East tensions and added that Beijing is ready to play a constructive role in restoring peace and stability. China, which relies on the region for its energy supplies, is becoming increasingly concerned about stability there. —

A lack of capacity to control voltage changes triggered Spain’s historic electricity outage in late April, Environmental Minister Sara Aagesen said today. Generation plants that should have been helping to regulate voltage weren’t operating, she said, without disclosing why that happened. Spain’s power grid collapsed in less than a minute on April 28, leaving more than 50 million people without electricity across the country and neighboring Portugal.