U.S. and Iranian officials said Sunday they still see a chance of a negotiated solution to the Iran war despite President Donald Trump’s rejection of Tehran’s latest offer.
Trump told Axios on Sunday that he expected U.S. negotiators to continue indirect talks with Iran this week.
But hostile rhetoric on both sides underscored the difficulty of any diplomatic efforts.
“We are fully prepared for the war to be resumed. … We stand firm in the face of any new aggression, even if it comes to a doomsday war,” Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi told NBC News on Sunday. At the same time, he said, “we stand ready for diplomacy. It is up to President Trump to choose.”
“If they are serious that they want a deal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, now there is the possibility,” Araghchi said.
On Saturday, Trump said he had rejected Iran’s latest proposal to end the war. “They want to make a deal where they open the strait immediately because they’re losing so badly,” Trump told reporters.
But Axios reported that Trump had confirmed during a Sunday phone interview that there were plans for indirect talks.
“I expect more talks with Iran [this week]. They want to make a deal, but it is not the deal that I want to make. It is what we would have maybe agreed to a year ago. They overplayed their hand,” Trump said, according to Axios.
U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Mike Waltz told NBC News‘s “Meet the Press” that the recent Iranian proposal was a “cynical attempt to put something on the table that they knew was unacceptable.” The proposal included demands that the United States lift sanctions on Iran, release frozen assets and end the U.S. naval blockade on Iranian ports, he said.
“At the end of the day, of course, this has to end in some type of arrangement. But he’s going to leave all options on the table to get there,” Waltz told NBC News.
Araghchi had said Tehran’s offer was similar to the memorandum of understanding both sides reached in June.
Both Araghchi and Waltz accused the other’s country of engaging in negotiations only to violate their terms.
“Again they offered negotiation, again we accepted, and again they attacked us in the middle of negotiations. … But I am still trying diplomacy because I think we shouldn’t miss any chance for peace,” Araghchi said.
Waltz told NBC News it was “common sense” that the president did not have much confidence in Iran’s offer after the country violated the memorandum of understanding brokered in June.
Trump had told the U.N. General Assembly on Tuesday that Iran could make a deal to end the war or face “annihilation.” The Iranian delegation walked out of the chamber.
The following day, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian told the U.N. that Iran was “ready for dialogue and diplomacy and negotiations without accepting the language of force.”
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