Iran says ‘understanding’ reached with US to guide nuclear talks

Iran’s top diplomat said the US and the Islamic republic have reached an “understanding” on principles to guide talks on a deal over Tehran’s nuclear programme following a meeting between the adversaries on Tuesday.

Iranian foreign minister Abbas Araghchi told reporters in Geneva that there had been “good developments” in the negotiations, but he also cautioned that it did not mean there would be an agreement soon.

“We eventually reached a general understanding on some principles to guide us going forward and to help draft the text of a potential agreement,” he said.

But Araghchi also warned that “this doesn’t mean we will reach an agreement soon, but at least the process has begun”.

“We hope this will happen soon, and we are ready to devote sufficient time to it,” he said. “However, once we begin drafting the text, it becomes more difficult and detailed.”

Brent crude sank nearly 2 per cent to $67.37 a barrel immediately after the conclusion of the talks.

The talks came after President Donald Trump repeated his warning of “consequences” if Tehran failed to agree to a deal.

The negotiations, which were facilitated by Oman, followed a round of indirect talks in Muscat earlier this month and came as the US continues its military build-up in the region.

Trump, who last week said he was deploying a second aircraft carrier strike group to the Middle East, said on Monday night that he would be “indirectly” involved in the talks, which he described as “very important”.

“I think they want to make a deal. I don’t think they want the consequences of not making a deal,” Trump told reporters on Air Force One.

Trump has repeatedly threatened military action against Iran if no agreement is reached after Tehran’s brutal crackdown on mass anti-regime protests last month, in which thousands of people were killed.

The US has dispatched additional warships, fighter jets and air defences to the Middle East over the past month.

Iranian officials have said they want a deal, but also that they are prepared for war.

The Revolutionary Guards this week began a naval exercise in the Strait of Hormuz, a key maritime trade route through which about a third of the world’s seaborne crude passes.

State television reported on Tuesday that the guards’ naval forces were set to clear parts of the strait for several hours to test anti-warship cruise missiles and rehearse the potential closure of the strategic waterway.

Alireza Tangsiri, commander of the guards’ navy, said his forces were ready to shut the waterway whenever Iran’s leaders ordered them to do so.

In a speech on Tuesday, Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei dismissed the US’s military threats, suggesting that the Islamic republic’s armed forces were capable of delivering powerful retaliatory strikes.

“Even the world’s most powerful armies can be struck in such a way that they are unable to stand back up,” he said, drawing applause from supporters.

Khamenei added that, just as previous US administrations failed to bring about changes of regime in Iran, any attempt to do so by Trump would also fail. “I tell him: you will not be able to do it either,” he said.

The talks this month are the first since the US briefly joined Israel’s 12-day war against the Islamic republic in June to bomb Iran’s main nuclear facilities.

Trump said the strikes “obliterated” Iran’s nuclear programme, but he has in recent weeks repeated that he wants a deal to ensure Iran has no nuclear weapons.

Diplomats have warned that there are huge challenges to secure a deal, given the deep levels of mistrust between the adversaries and the gap between their expectations from the talks.

Iran, which is at its most vulnerable in decades, is also determined to project defiance and not be seen to be capitulating to Trump’s demands under duress.

A critical stumbling block has been the US’s long-standing demand that Iran permanently give up its ability to enrich uranium, a process that can yield both nuclear fuel and weapons-grade material.

Tehran has rejected that demand, insisting it has a right to enrich as a signatory to the non-proliferation treaty, and has denied it is seeking to develop nuclear arms.

Khamenei said demands that Iran abandon nuclear energy entirely were unacceptable. “Predetermining the outcome of negotiations in advance is foolish,” he said.

Turkey’s foreign minister Hakan Fidan, who has been involved in the mediation efforts, told the FT last week that the “Americans appear willing to tolerate Iranian enrichment within clearly set boundaries”.

Washington has also sought to include curbs on Iran’s ballistic missile programme and its support for regional militants in the talks, while Tehran insists they should only focus on the nuclear issue.

Trump’s messaging, however, has been mixed, with the president suggesting that a deal covering only Iran’s nuclear programme could be “acceptable”.

Araghchi on Monday held talks with Rafael Grossi, director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, which is trying to get access to the three sites bombed by the US and Israel in June. 

Last week, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said Tehran was willing to open up its nuclear sites for “any verification” to prove it was not seeking to build nuclear weapons.

Iran has prevented the IAEA accessing the sites since they were bombed, amid western concerns about the fate of a stockpile of more than 400kg of uranium enriched to a purity close to weapons-grade levels. 

Araghchi said on Monday that he was “in Geneva with real ideas to achieve a fair and equitable deal”.

“What is not on the table: submission before threats,” he said in a post on X.

Additional reporting by Mercedes Ruehl in Geneva