Iran and the United States agreed to continue nuclear conversations next week, both parties said, as Iraní Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said, he said it was “extremely cautious” about the potential success of negotiations aimed at resolving a decades of duration.
The president of the United States, Donald Trump, has pointed out the confidence in ensuring a new pact with the Islamic Republic that would block Tehran’s path to a nuclear bomb.
On Saturday, the envoy of the Middle East of Araghchi and Trump, Steve Witkoff, held a third round of indirect conversations in the capital of Oman, Muscat through Mediators of Omaní for approximately six hours, a week after a second round in Rome that both parties described as constructive.
“The negotiations are extremely serious and technical … there are still differentials, both in important issues and in details,” Araghchi told Iranian State TV.
“There is seriousness and determination on both sides … However, our optimism about the success of conversations remains extremely cautious.”
A senior official of the United States administration described conversations as positive and productive, added that both parties agree to meet again in Europe “soon.”
“There is still much to do, but progress was made to reach an agreement,” added the official.
Previously, Omaní Foreign Minister Badr Albusaidi had said that the conversations would continue next week, with another “high -level meeting” provisionally scheduled for May 3. Araghchi said he announces the place.
Speaking before aboard Air Force One and on the way to Rome for the funeral of Pope Francis, Trump also expressed his cautious optimism.
“Iran’s situation is going very well,” he said. “We had many conversations with them and I think we are going to have a deal. I would see myself a treatment than the other alternative. That would be good for humanity.”
But Trump also repeated threats that stress that military options remained on the table if diplomacy failed, saying: “There are some people who because to make a different child a more unpleasant treatment, and I do not do HAP
An Iranian official reported on the conversations, he previously told the Reuters news agency that the expert negotiations were “difficult, complicated and serious.”
The only objective of these conversations, said Araghchi, was “to generate confidence about the peaceful nature of Iran’s nuclear program in exchange for the relief of sanctions.”
Meanwhile, the spokesman of the Iran’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs told State TV that the country’s defense and missile programs were not discussed negotiations in Omanan.
“The question of defense capacities and the country’s missiles is not [on the agenda] And he has not raised his leg in indirect conversations with the United States, “Esmaeil Baghaei said Saturday.
The tensions have remained high since Trump retired from the Tehran Nuclear Agreement in 2015 with the world powers in 2018, which caused a series of climbs. Since then, Iran has abandoned all the limits in its nuclear program, and enriches Uranium to 60 percent of purity purity levels or 90 percent.
Western countries, including the United States, have long accused Iran or that seek to acquire nuclear weapons, an accusation that Tehran has constantly denied, insisting that their program is for peaceful civil purposes.
The Secretary of State of the United States, Marco Rubio, said earlier this week, Iran would have to stop enriching uranium under an agreement and import any enriched uranium that he needed to feed his atomic energy plant in operation, Bushhr.
Tehran is willing to negotiate some curbs in its nuclear work in exchange for the lifting of sanctions, according to Iranian officials, but ending their enrichment or southern programs.
European states have suggested to US negotiators that a comprehensive agreement must include limits that prevent them from acquiring or ends the ability to put a nuclear eye on a ballistic missile, several European diplomats said.
But Tehran insists that their defense capabilities, such as their missile program, are not negotiable.