Iran signals openness to indirect talks after Trump letter

NEW YORK – Iran announced Thursday that it had responded to a letter from President Donald Trump in which the U.S. president had urged direct negotiations with the government in Tehran on a deal to curb the country’s advancing nuclear program.

Iran appeared to be taking the middle ground, neither rejecting negotiations with the United States nor accepting face-to-face talks with Trump.

But Kamal Kharazi, the top foreign policy adviser to Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said, according to local news reports, “The Islamic Republic has not closed all the doors and is willing to begin indirect negotiations with the United States.”

The countries have not had official diplomatic relations since the Islamic Revolution in 1979, but they have engaged directly and indirectly on issues such as the nuclear program, detainee swaps and regional tensions.

Iran said it submitted its written reply to Trump through Oman on Wednesday. The foreign minister of Iran, Abbas Araghchi, said Iran had presented a comprehensive view on the issues raised by Trump and on the overall situation in the Middle East, according to the official news agency IRNA.

“Our policy is to not negotiate directly while there is maximum pressure policy and threats of military strikes,” Araghchi said Thursday. “But indirect negotiations can take place as they have in the past.”

Trump sent the letter this month to Khamenei, saying he preferred diplomacy to military action.

“I’ve written them a letter saying, ‘I hope you’re going to negotiate, because if we have to go in militarily, it’s going to be a terrible thing,’ ” Trump told Fox News. “You can’t let them have a nuclear weapon.”

An Iranian official who asked not to be named because he was not authorized to speak publicly said Trump had set a two-month deadline for Iran to negotiate.

If talks on a deal to curb Iran’s nuclear program fail, Israel and the United States have suggested the possibility of launching targeted strikes on the two main underground nuclear facilities in Iran.

But that risks setting off a wider regional war since Iran has warned it would respond to any strikes on its soil. And any attacks could destabilize the Middle East, with Iran turning to its network of weakened but still active proxy militias.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.