Trump's stringent demands on Iran risk bogging down potential talks, sources say
The US has issued far-reaching demands to Iran to end the war, conditions that Tehran is likely to view as a non-starter, sources familiar with the matter have told Middle East Eye.
Turkey, Pakistan and Egypt have been trying to establish a channel between the US and Iran to secure a short ceasefire or open talks aimed at exploring terms both sides might find acceptable as a way forward since last week.
However, one source familiar with the discussions said the Trump administration had presented its demands in a manner similar to Russia's approach in its talks with Ukraine last year in Istanbul, when Moscow pressed Kyiv to make core concessions.
Ukraine rejected those terms as unacceptable. They included ceding territory, limiting Ukraine's military forces and reshaping the Ukrainian government in ways that would satisfy Moscow. At the time, some Western diplomats described the conditions as a "capitulation", given the years of fighting.
"The US passed a long list of demands, very similar to the 15-point plans Trump envoy Steven Witkoff drafted for Ukraine," one source familiar with the discussions told MEE.
"It includes every US demand that had already been circulating."
Several Trump administration officials have previously said that the US wants Iran to reduce its nuclear enrichment to zero, halt the development of its ballistic missile infrastructure and stop expanding its proxy network in the region.
Now, with Iran tightening its grip over the Strait of Hormuz, through which 27 percent of global oil products pass, additional demands from Gulf countries have reportedly been added to the list.
President Donald Trump's administration now wants assurances, possibly including joint control, over the strait to ensure the free flow of energy shipments.
"We don't hold our breath for negotiations. We simply won't allow them to happen so long as Iran's conditions are not met," Fereshteh Sadeghi, a Tehran-based freelance journalist with access to Iranian government circles, told MEE.
MEE previously reported that Iran has two main demands: guarantees against future attacks and compensation for its losses.
Several publications have reported that the US was inclined to hold negotiations with Iran's parliament speaker, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, in Islamabad, possibly even sending Vice President JD Vance to discuss a comprehensive deal, as Trump reportedly promised not to strike Iran's power plants in order to leave room for talks.
Some Iranian experts view Ghalibaf as the country's de facto ruler, who has strong ties to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), and the Iranian reformists, as Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei is said to be incapacitated by his injuries.
Ghalibaf swiftly rejected the suggestion that any talks with Washington were taking place. Yet several sources said some form of engagement, if not formal negotiations, was still under way in an effort to pave the way for possible talks.
Ghalibaf argued that Trump was trying to buy time to manipulate the financial and oil markets.
"Iran cannot send representatives for negotiations, people would devour them," Sadeghi said, adding that "some people" could still be dispatched to lay out Iran's own conditions.
Another source familiar with the matter told MEE that the US was grappling with finding the right person to reach out to in Tehran given that all the senior Iranian leadership has been either killed or are inaccessible.
"They don't know for certain who could be more amenable to the talks due to fast pace of change at the top," the source said.
'Fake gesture'
Trump has given Tehran until Friday, a deadline that coincides with the arrival of 2,000 US Marines, alongside the USS Tripoli and the amphibious transport dock USS New Orleans.
Some believe the president may be using the prospect of negotiations to buy time for possible ground operations targeting three key Iranian islands in the Strait of Hormuz, a move that could hand control of the waterway to the Americans.
"We believe this is another fake gesture, meant to buy time for Marines to reach the region and for the US regime to invade the Iranian islands, especially Kharg," Sadeghi said.
Even so, there may still be some hope for diplomacy, as Tehran could seek an off-ramp of its own. A new round of fighting might draw Gulf countries into the war and leave Iran’s energy infrastructure unusable.
'Washington can live with a weakened Iranian regime so long as it is denied a pathway to nuclear weapons, constrained in its missile capabilities, and compelled to rein in its regional proxies'
- Kamran Bokhari, Middle East Policy Council
Kamran Bokhari, a senior resident fellow at the Middle East Policy Council in Washington, said the US retained far greater flexibility than was seen in the Russia-Ukraine talks, as Moscow had been negotiating from a position of existential urgency.
"Washington can live with a weakened Iranian regime so long as it is denied a pathway to nuclear weapons, constrained in its missile capabilities, and compelled to rein in its regional proxies," he told MEE.
"Indeed, in line with the baseline Venezuela model, the Trump White House appears prepared to work with a behaviourally transformed regime rather than insist on outright regime change."
Reza Talebi, an academic researcher at the University of Leipzig, said a solution resembling the Venezuela model - in which a second-in-command within the government cooperated with Washington - was not plausible in the short term.
"That would require a prolonged economic collapse and a deep internal political rupture," he said.
Bokhari added that demands are only as credible as battlefield realities allow.
While Russia has failed to militarily subdue its much weaker neighbour, the US, together with Israel, has significantly weakened the Iranian regime, increasing the appetite in Tehran for negotiations.
This article was sourced from Middle East Eye.
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