Iran’s nuclear plans and military capabilities; its international alliances and the sanctions that have long hit its economy hard; control of the Strait of Hormuz. While waiting to know Tehran’s response to the US proposal, these are the main issues that remain unresolved between Washington and Tehran, the thorniest and most divisive issues between the two parties. Without a meeting point on these points, it is difficult to reach the desired agreement.
For Donald Trump (as for Israel) it is first and foremost crucial that Iran “can never have a nuclear weapon”, a weapon that Tehran denies wanting to develop, while instead continuing to claim the right to enrich uranium for civilian purposes. According to international inspectors cited by the New York Times, Iran has a total of about 11 tons of enriched uranium, which, with further processing, could allow it to develop up to 100 nuclear weapons. US media reported that, in the first round of talks in Islamabad, Washington asked the other side to stop the enrichment program for 20 years.
The Iranians, for their part, would have opened up to a pause of five years at most. Another issue indicated in the past as transcendental by Washington is that of the Iranian missile arsenal. The US aims to limit Tehran’s ability to rebuild it, after the damage inflicted by the recent Israeli-US campaigns, and develop it further. While Iran, underlines Al Jazeera, in addition to having made extensive use of it also in the response to the attacks launched on February 28, has repeatedly sent signals that it does not consider this a negotiable aspect.
Since the truce announced by Trump on April 8, the issue has no longer been raised openly by the American side, the same source underlines. A further objective of Washington is to get Iran to cut support for its network of regional allies (Hezbollah in Lebanon, Houthis in Yemen, Hamas in Gaza and the militias in Iraq). However, at the moment there are no signals in this line from Tehran.
As an example of this, the ayatollah regime has also in recent weeks maintained its support for its ally in Lebanon in the conflict with Israel (now on apparent stand-by due to the fragile truce in force). Then there’s Hormuz. The high tension situation in the Strait, a crucial area for international trade, remains the most pressing issue of current affairs. After the first round of talks in Islamabad and the imposition by the US of a naval blockade in the area, Tehran has shown itself not willing to engage in new direct negotiations as long as this measure remains in force.
At the same time, Iran itself has imposed a de facto blockade on the Strait, littering it with mines and allowing only a limited number of ships to pass through it subject to a toll, resulting in chaos for global energy markets. Last but not least, Iran has called for the lifting of all existing US and international sanctions against it as part of a deal. And he insists on the request for war reparations.