Iran and the US held talks in Oman on April 12 and agreed to reconvene next week, the Iranian side said, a dialogue meant to address Tehran’s fast-advancing nuclear programme, with US President Donald Trump threatening military action if there is no deal.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi posted on his Telegram channel that his delegation had a brief encounter with its US counterpart, headed by Mr Trump’s Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff, after they exited the indirect talks mediated by Oman.
“After the end of more than 2½ hours of indirect talks, the heads of the Iranian and American delegations spoke for a few minutes in the presence of the Omani foreign minister as they left the talks,” he said.
He said the talks - a first between Iran and a Trump administration, including his first term in 2017-21 - took place in a “productive and positive atmosphere”.
“Both sides have agreed to continue the talks next week,” Mr Araqchi wrote, without elaborating about the venue and date.
There was no immediate US comment on the talks.
Underlining the profound rift between the US and Iran, Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmail Baghaei earlier said on X that each delegation had its separate room and would exchange messages via Oman’s foreign minister.
“The current focus of the talks will be de-escalating regional tensions, prisoner exchanges and limited agreements to ease sanctions (against Iran) in exchange for controlling Iran’s nuclear programme,” an Omani source told Reuters. Mr Baghaei denied this account but did not specify what was false.
Oman has long been an intermediary between Western powers and Iran, having brokered the release of several foreign citizens and dual nationals held by the Islamic Republic.
Iran is approaching the talks warily, sceptical that they could lead to a deal and suspicious of Mr Trump, who has repeatedly threatened to bomb Iran if it does not halt its nuclear programme.
While each side has talked up the chances of some progress, they remain far apart on a dispute that has rumbled on for more than two decades, and have not agreed on whether the talks will be face to face, as Mr Trump demands, or indirect, as Iran wants.
The April 12 exchanges appeared indirect, as Iran had wanted, rather than face-to-face, as Trump had demanded.
“This is a beginning. So it is normal at this stage for the two sides to present to each other their fundamental positions through the Omani intermediary,” Mr Baghaei said.
Signs of movement could help cool tensions in a region aflame since 2023 with wars in Gaza and Lebanon, missile fire between Iran and Israel, Houthi attacks on Red Sea shipping and the overthrow of the government in Syria.
High stakes
However, failure would aggravate fears of a wider conflagration across a region that exports much of the world’s oil. Tehran has cautioned neighbouring countries that have US bases that they would face “severe consequences” if they were involved in any US military attack on Iran.
“There is a chance for initial understanding on further negotiations if the other party (US) enters the talks with an equal stance,” Mr Araqchi told Iranian TV.
Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei – who, in the Islamic Republic’s complex power structure, has the final say on key state matters – has given Mr Araqchi “full authority” for the talks, an Iranian official told Reuters.
“The duration of the talks, that will only be about the nuclear issue, will depend on the US side’s seriousness and goodwill,” said the official, speaking on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the matter.
Iran has ruled out negotiating its defence capabilities such as its missile programme.
Iran has always maintained its nuclear programme is intended for purely civilian purposes, but Western countries believe it wants to build an atomic bomb.
They say Iran’s enrichment of uranium, a nuclear fuel source, has gone far beyond the requirements of a civilian programme and has produced stocks at a level of fissile purity close to those required in warheads.
Mr Trump, who has restored a “maximum pressure” campaign on Tehran since February, ditched a 2015 nuclear pact between Iran and six world powers in 2018 during his first term, reimposing crippling sanctions on the Islamic Republic.
Since then, Iran’s nuclear programme has leaped forward, including by enriching uranium to 60 per cent, a technical step from the levels needed for a bomb.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on April 10 he hoped that the talks would lead to peace, adding: “We’ve been very clear what Iran is never going to have a nuclear weapon, and I think that’s what led to this meeting.”
Tehran responded the following day, saying it was giving the US a “genuine chance”, despite what it called Washington’s “prevailing confrontational hoopla”.
Washington’s ally Israel, which regards Iran’s nuclear programme as an existential threat, has long threatened to attack Iran if diplomacy fails to curb its nuclear ambitions.
Tehran’s influence throughout the Middle East has been severely curbed, with its regional allies – known as the “Axis of Resistance” – either dismantled or badly hurt since the start of the Hamas-Israel conflict in Gaza and the fall of Bashar al-Assad in Syria in December.
The Axis includes not only Hamas but also Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Houthis in Yemen, and various Shi’ite armed groups in Iraq and Syria
