US Vice President JD Vance, Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff and Iran’s foreign minister were involved in ceasefire talks overnight, with a two-step deal expected to be announced as soon as today, a report has claimed.
Washington and Tehran are considering a deal The signing today would trigger an immediate ceasefire before individual talks for a comprehensive agreement later, Reuters reports. While Reuters has cited only one unnamed “source” since the publication of its report, the Iranian Foreign Ministry has said it has indeed received the text of the proposed ceasefire through the intermediary, the Pakistani military, lending credibility to the wire service’s claims.
According to reports, US Vice President JD Vance and President Donald Trump’s omnipresent peace envoy Steve Witkoff were in talks overnight with Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, one of the few surviving members of Iran’s post-war government, after weeks of “assassination” attacks by Pakistani army chief Field Marshal Asim Munir. It said the agreement is intended to proceed in two phases: an immediate ceasefire, followed by negotiations on a “comprehensive” peace deal in the Middle East if the parties agree.
It was said to come in two to three weeks and would involve in-person talks in Pakistan, and Iran accepting that its nuclear ambitions were gone forever in exchange for relief from the sanctions regime. These comments follow other comments by Araghchi over the weekend, who claimed that the country’s position on talks is “being misrepresented by the US media” and that Iran is fully willing to negotiate. Still this claim came Iran denied this a few weeks later Things were happening anyway.
While Iran has now acknowledged that talks are taking place, they have, in their usual fashion, denied that anything was possible, presumably intending to send as much of a message to their own people as to the international audience. israel time According to reports, Tehran has complained that it does not like being blackmailed or pressured into a decision – apparently a reference to the deadline set by President Trump – and their foreign affairs spokesman said this morning that they have “prepared their responses” to the ceasefire proposals they have received.
He reportedly said: “Iran does not hesitate to clearly express its legitimate demands and doing so should not be understood as a sign of agreement, but as a reflection of its confidence in defending its position”. Additionally, it was said this morning that Tehran had insisted that they would not reopen the Strait of Hormuz for a temporary ceasefire, perhaps the most significant concession they would have to make to end the war.
Over the weekend, President Trump made it crystal clear that there would be consequences if a ceasefire was not reached soon this week, setting an apparent deadline of Tuesday night Eastern time to release the United States Air Force from its metaphorical leash. President Trump noted that so far, U.S. strikes have avoided affecting the infrastructure that makes continued human civilization possible in Iranian territory, including the power stations and oil plants that drive its economy, and that once the negotiations deadline passes, that obstacle will end.
Underscoring the importance of reopening the Strait of Hormuz, the strategic waterway through which most of the Earth’s oil trade flows, President Trump said of the importance of Iran accepting the terms: “Tuesday will be Power Plant Day and Bridge Day, all wrapped up in one for Iran. Nothing like it!!! Open the fuckin’ Strait, you crazy bastards”.
After these comments, apart from President Trump, other people also spoke to Fox News on Sunday and said that the talks were going well. President Trump said that the Iranians on the negotiating team “have been granted amnesty at this time so they can continue to negotiate” – which may go some way toward explaining why Secretary of State Araghchi has lived longer than his Iranian government colleagues.
In encouraging remarks about the prospects for an agreement, President Trump said, “I think there’s a good chance tomorrow, they’re negotiating right now”. However, he repeated his warning, telling the broadcaster: “If they don’t make a deal quickly, I’m considering blowing up everything and taking over the oil… You’ll see bridges and power plants falling down all over their country”.
Last month it was said that the US and Pakistan would actually have to talk Israel out of the killing of Aragchi in order to leave them with someone in the Iranian government to negotiate. Obviously, such protection from attacks remains relevant, and Breitbart News reported today that the head of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) intelligence organization in Iran, Majid Khadimi, was killed in another targeted Israeli strike.
