Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said Tehran would not surrender to US pressure but remained ready for negotiations, as Iranian officials reviewed Washington’s response to a proposal aimed at ending the nearly seven-month war.

“We will never bow our head or bend at the knee,” Pezeshkian told the 81st United Nations General Assembly in New York on Wednesday. He said Iran was ready for “dialogue and diplomacy and negotiations” but would not accept what he described as the language of force.

The US delegation walked out as Pezeshkian began speaking. Reuters reported that the US mission to the UN did not immediately comment on the walkout.

A senior Iranian official, speaking to Reuters on condition of anonymity, said Tehran was examining Washington’s response to its proposals for ending the conflict. Iran’s priorities include lifting the US naval blockade on Iranian ports and reopening the Strait of Hormuz, the official said.

“There are still many differences between the Iranian and US positions, but diplomacy is continuing,” the official said.

Pezeshkian focused part of his UN address on the Strait of Hormuz, arguing that other countries could not continue benefiting from the waterway while Iran was denied normal access to it.

“It cannot be the case that everyone benefits from the Strait of Hormuz while we are denied access to shipping through this waterway,” he said. He also warned that expanding the war would not bring security to the region.

The strait carried about a fifth of global oil and liquefied natural gas shipments before the war, according to Reuters. Washington says it must remain fully open to international shipping, while Tehran has sought greater control over passage through the waterway and fees from vessels using it.

Pezeshkian also reiterated Iran’s position that it does not seek nuclear weapons, while rejecting restrictions on what Tehran describes as peaceful nuclear technology. “No nuclear weapons and no limitations to peaceful nuclear technology,” he said.

His remarks followed a speech by US President Donald Trump on Tuesday in which Trump threatened to “annihilate the Islamic Republic” if an agreement was not reached and called on other countries to economically isolate Iran. Pezeshkian described Trump’s language as evidence of a “bullying mentality”.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Wednesday that reaching an agreement with Iran would require “hard work over a period of time”, while adding that Trump retained military options.

Iranian and US officials had held their first known indirect talks in months on Tuesday. Reuters reported that Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi and US envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner communicated through mediators, with a Qatari intermediary relaying messages during a two-hour exchange.

Trump initially said US officials had held a meeting with an Iranian delegation, but later said Witkoff and Kushner had met Iranian mediators rather than Iranian officials directly.

Iranian lawmaker Ahmad Bakhshayesh Ardestani had separately said he believed a meeting between Pezeshkian and Trump in New York was likely. A senior Iranian official contradicted that assessment, telling Reuters before Pezeshkian’s speech that the Iranian president would not meet Trump at the UN.

The latest Reuters reporting said the two governments remained far apart and that their exchanges had produced no publicly announced concessions, although both sides continued to leave open a diplomatic channel.