As Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian describes it, Iran has agreed to talks with the United States when friendly governments in Iran's neighborhood have requested them.
In a post published in several languages on social media, Pezeshkian announced that Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi has been instructed to pursue “fair and equitable negotiations,” if circumstances are suitable, “without threats and unreasonable expectations.”
Trump: Time is running out
Iran has long resisted direct talks with the United States, at least outwardly, and last fall the country's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, flatly refused. The US government has tried to put increasing pressure on the country.
The US has sent a large war fleet to the region and President Donald Trump recently warned that "time is running out" as he urged Iran to meet him in negotiations.
The Iranian side says it has not taken a position on any American ultimatum. Any talks are also said to be exclusively about the nuclear energy issue.
Multiple attempts
This is the third time in a year that Trump has tried to force Iran to the negotiating table. The first attempt ended with the US bombing of Iran and its nuclear facilities in June last year.
A few weeks ago, the situation peaked again: the US president was said to be considering a new attack while widespread protests raged in Iran, but the president refrained. The protests were crushed with brutal violence.
US government sources are doubtful that Iran's ayatollah is prepared to even remotely meet Trump's demands, Axios reports.
Meet on Friday?
On Monday, one of Iran's pro-regime news agencies reported that the government had agreed to begin talks with the United States. The media report disappeared later in the day, without explanation.
Then came US media reports that Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi and US envoy Steve Witkoff will meet in Istanbul, Turkey, on Friday. The US government has not confirmed this.
Ali Shamkhani, a close adviser to Iran's ayatollah and a member of the regime's security council, also did not confirm the talks when he appeared in a television interview on Monday night, AP reports. But if negotiations were to take place, they would be indirect at first to see if they could actually yield anything, he said.
