Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said on Tuesday that the latest round of talks with the United States in Geneva yielded a mutual understanding of “guiding principles” for even more talks.
Araghchi struck a defiant note going into the indirect talks with U.S. envoy Steve Witkoff and President Donald Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner. “I am in Geneva with real ideas to achieve a fair and equitable deal. What is not on the table: submission before threats,” he growled in a post on X.
Araghchi’s ultimate superior, Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was even more defiant, threatening to sink a U.S. aircraft carrier if President Trump followed through on his threats to use more airstrikes against Iran’s illicit nuclear program.
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The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), a designated terrorist organization, decided that Tuesday would be a good day to close the strategically vital Strait of Hormuz for live-fire missile drills.
After all that belligerent table-setting, intermediary Badr al-Busaidi, the foreign minister of Oman, gushed that Tuesday’s talks were “constructive” and made “good progress” towards “identifying common goals and relevant technical issues.”
“Different ideas have been presented, these ideas have been seriously discussed, ultimately we’ve been able to reach a general agreement on some guiding principles,” Araghchi told Iranian media, sounding a tad less upbeat than Busaidi.
Speaking at a disarmament conference in Geneva later that day, Araghchi said the talks have opened a “new window of opportunity” that could lead to a “sustainable” resolution of tensions between Iran and the United States.
Araghchi qualified this optimistic statement by insisting that any agreement “must ensure the full recognition of Iran’s legitimate rights to deliver tangible benefits, and be safeguarded against unilateral actions.”
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The Iranian foreign minister insisted that his regime “remains fully prepared to defend itself against any threat or act of aggression,” and that its retaliation against any U.S. military action “will not be confined to its borders.”
A U.S. official told Reuters that “progress was made, but there are still a lot of details to discuss.”
“Indirect talks” means the Iranian and U.S. envoys are not speaking directly to each other, but rather passing messages through a mediator, in this case the Omani foreign minister. Getting to direct talks would presumably mark a major step forward in genuine conflict resolution. To date, the indirect talks in Oman and Geneva have produced nothing but promises to hold further discussions, without any major change in the format.
Cynical observers see Iran doing little more than playing for time, without putting any serious concessions on the table. United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI) policy director Jason Brodsky predicted the outcome of Tuesday’s meeting with perfect accuracy, right down to the words used by Araghchi and Busaidi.
“Everyone is framing Tuesday’s Geneva talks as ‘high-stakes.’ In all likelihood we’ll get vague readouts with both sides claiming it was ‘useful’ and ‘constructive’ as Iran’s regime will say and do enough to earn another meeting, whereas the U.S. will want to buy time until all desired military assets are in the region,” he anticipated.
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“I would be surprised not to see a third meeting come out of this as both sides have an interest in keeping up appearances of diplomacy for now to avoid a public breakdown as that would create pressure for decisions,” he said, peering a bit further into the future.
Tehran is running a side hustle with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which is always eager to avoid conflict in exchange for the most minimal cooperation with its inspection demands.
Araghchi held a telephone conversation with IAEA Director-General Rafael Grossi on Wednesday in which the Iranian foreign minister claimed his government is “drafting” proposals for “an initial and coherent framework to advance future talks.”
Grossi obligingly declared the Tuesday talks in Geneva were “positive” and looked forward to future Iranian cooperation with his inspectors – even though Iran’s failure to cooperate was the precipitating event for Israeli and U.S. strikes against Iran’s nuclear program last summer.
In an interview with Foreign Policy on Wednesday, Grossi acknowledged that Iran blamed the IAEA for giving Israel and the United States cause to launch airstrikes.
“We were not ill-intentioned or in collusion with someone to wage war against a country – which would be absolutely absurd from every possible angle – because the IAEA has to be objective and tell it as it is,” he insisted.
Grossi said it was clear that Iran’s “accumulation of highly enriched uranium” was “raising lots of questions” – but the “situation is different” now, because “the physical damage” from U.S. strikes was “very big,” and Iran’s uranium enrichment program is “not operational anymore.”
The IAEA director went on to concede that Iran is not answering important questions about its stockpile of near-weapons-grade uranium and has yet to make any major concessions to inspectors, but he nevertheless believes “Iran understands that we need to go back” to the inspection regime it previously undermined.
It seems likely that if Tehran believes U.S. military action is imminent, it would announce some dramatic agreement with the IAEA to resume inspections, thus gaining Grossi as an immediate ally in favor of extended negotiations.
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