The United States should not intervene militarily in the fighting between Israel and Iran amid continuing speculation that U.S. President Donald Trump could order the bombing of Iranian nuclear sites, Kremlin spokesman Dmitri Peskov said on Thursday.

Speaking at the St Petersburg Economic Forum (SPIEF), Mr Peskov said intervention by Washington could set off a spiral of escalation and cause a wider war in the region.

The Kremlin said that President Vladimir Putin had spoken by phone to Chinese President Xi Jinping about the situation in the Middle East, with Mr Xi backing a possible mediation role for Putin, as offered by Moscow.

Mr Putin is to visit China on September 2.

Speaking to major news agencies, Mr Putin said Russia would not abandon its work at Iran’s Bushehr nuclear power station, where he said some 600 Russian experts were working.

“We will not leave,” Mr Putin said. Moscow backs the peaceful use of nuclear power in Iran but rejects its acquisition of nuclear weapons.

The head of Russian state nuclear energy corporation Rosatom, Alexey Likhachev, warned in St Petersburg that Bushehr should not be attacked.

He said that an attack could cause a disaster similar to the 1986 Chernobyl catastrophe.

Mr Likhachev said there was no reason for the Russian experts at Bushehr to be taken to safety, but that a few dozen had been flown out of Iran.

He added that most of the nuclear equipment set up underground in Iran had thus far survived Israeli bombing attacks, including the uranium enrichment plant in Natanz.

By contrast, International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) head Rafael Grossi told the BBC earlier this week that the Natanz centrifuges were likely “severely damaged, if not completely destroyed.’’

(dpa/NAN)