Iran president gives go-ahead for talks with US
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Iran’s president says he instructed the country’s foreign minister to “pursue fair and equitable negotiations” with the United States.
Pezeshkian said talks with the US should be pursued to secure national interests as long as “threats and unreasonable expectations” are avoided.
“Taking into account demands from friendly regional countries to respond to the US President’s suggestion for talks, I instructed the foreign minister to prepare the ground for equitable and fair negotiations … should an atmosphere free of threats and unreasonable expectations arise,” Pezeshkian, he posted on X.
Tuesday’s announcement marked a major turn for reformist Pezeshkian, who broadly had warned Iranians for weeks the turmoil in his country had gone beyond his control. It also signals the president received support from Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei for talks that the 86-year-old cleric previously had dismissed.
US special envoy Steve Witkoff and Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi will meet in Istanbul on Friday in an effort to revive diplomacy over a long-running dispute about Iran’s nuclear program and dispel fears of a new regional war.
Turkey and other regional allies have sought de-escalation.
“Qatar, Saudi Arabia, UAE and Egypt as well as some other countries will attend the Istanbul meeting. There will be bilateral, trilateral and other meetings,” the diplomat said.
Tensions are running high amid a US naval build-up near Iran, following a violent crackdown against anti-government demonstrations last month, the deadliest domestic unrest in Iran since its 1979 revolution.
US President Donald Trump, who stopped short of carrying out threats to intervene during the crackdown, has since demanded Iran make nuclear concessions and sent a flotilla to its coast.
He said last week Iran was “seriously talking” while Iran’s top security official Ali Larijani said arrangements for negotiations were under way.
Iranian sources told Reuters last week that Trump had demanded three conditions for resumption of talks: zero enrichment of uranium in Iran, limits on Iran’s ballistic missile program and ending its support for regional proxies.
Iran has long rejected all three demands as unacceptable infringements of its sovereignty but two Iranian officials told Reuters its clerical rulers saw the ballistic missile program, rather than uranium enrichment, as the bigger obstacle.
Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei said Iran was considering “the various dimensions and aspects of the talks,” adding that “time is of the essence for Iran as it wants the lifting of unjust sanctions sooner”.
A Turkish ruling party official told Reuters that Iran and the US had agreed to re-focus on diplomacy and possible talks this week, in a reprieve for potential US strikes.
Witkoff was expected to visit Israel to meet Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Israel’s military chief, two senior Israeli officials said separately.
The Iranian official said “diplomacy is ongoing. For talks to resume, Iran says there should not be preconditions and that it is ready to show flexibility on uranium enrichment, including handing over 400kg of highly enriched uranium, accepting zero enrichment under a consortium arrangement as a solution”.
However, he added, for the start of talks, Iran wanted US military assets moved away from Iran.
“Now the ball is in Trump’s court,” he said.
After five rounds of talks that have stalled since May 2023, several hard-to-bridge issues remained between Iran and the US, including Iran’s insistence on maintaining uranium enrichment on its soil and refusal to ship abroad its entire existing stockpile of highly enriched uranium.
The US and its allies fear Iran’s uranium enrichment could yield material for a warhead.
Iran says its nuclear program is only for electricity generation and other civilian uses.
Iranian sources said the country could ship its highly enriched uranium abroad and pause enrichment in a deal that should also include the lifting of economic sanctions.
with EFE and AP
Reuters