As US confirms indirect talks with Iran, devil or cherub is in hidden detail

Developments continue to indicate a slight improvement in relations between Iran and the US, to the point that it is clear Tehran and Washington are maintaining contact via indirect talks enabled by intermediaries—but whether the two sides are doing anything more than underscoring their red lines to each other is open to question.

On June 12, Reuters quoted an unnamed Biden administration official as saying that what the US and Iran were not doing was discussing an interim nuclear agreement, which would partially replace the abandoned 2015 nuclear deal, or JCPOA, aimed at keeping Iran’s nuclear development programme entirely civil. Washington, however, has, the official said, told Tehran of steps that could trigger a crisis and also outlined steps that could establish a better climate between the long-time antagonists.

"We have made clear to them what escalatory steps they needed to avoid to prevent a crisis and what de-escalatory steps they could take to create a more positive context," he was reported as saying, declining to detail those steps but noting that Washington would like to see greater Iranian cooperation with the UN nuclear watchdog.

A report in The New Arab on June 14 said Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu allegedly told lawmakers in the Knesset that Israel would be able “to handle” a “mini-deal”, rather than a nuclear deal mark II, between the US and Iran.

It is clear that one key concern of the US is to obtain assurances from Tehran that it will not move to increase its enrichment of uranium from 60% purity to 90%, the level regarded as weapons-grade. Iran has always denied having any ambition to build a nuclear bomb.

In another indication of a re-engagement of diplomacy between Iran and Western powers, Tehran’s lead nuclear negotiator Ali Bagheri Kani met with European officials on June 13.

Bagheri Kani said in a tweet that he discussed a “range of issues and mutual concerns” with officials from Germany, France and the UK during a visit to the United Arab Emirates.

The European trio remain signatories of the 2015 pact that restricted Iran’s nuclear programme in exchange for major sanctions relief. Iran has gradually broken key provisions of the multilateral deal since the US unilaterally abandoned it at then president Donald Trump’s instigation in May 2018 and commenced what Tehran says is a “sanctions war”.

Under Joe Biden, the US appears to have substantially relaxed its enforcement of the Trump-introduced policy of attempting to keep Iranian oil off global export markets. There is some speculation that in tandem with arranging more indirect talks with Iran, Biden officials have reduced the enforcement to an even greater degree of late, though curious Iranian news reports based on Eurostat data—concluding that despite the still applicable sanctions Germany and Bulgaria imported significant shipments of Iranian crude oil or petroleum products in the first quarter—are yet to be explained.

Another sign of a very moderate warming in Tehran and Washington’s icy relations came on June 14 when the US confirmed that, despite financial system sanctions that remain levied on Iran, it has permitted Iraq to release $2.7bn in electricity supply debts it owed to its neighbour.

Limits apply to what Iran is allowed by Washington to spend the funds on. Matthew Miller, a spokesperson for the US Department of State, told reporters: “Iran can only access its funds held in accounts for Iraq for humanitarian and other non-sanctionable transactions.”

Iranian officials have confirmed that the money will be used for Iranian Hajj pilgrims' expenses and foodstuffs imported by Iran.

The thawing in relations between Iran and Gulf Arab nations seen in recent months got another boost on June 13 when US Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs Barbara Leaf told lawmakers that Bahrain, which broke off its diplomatic ties with Iran in 2016, a day after Saudi Arabia did so because of attacks on the Saudi embassy in Tehran, is likely to resume them "sometime soon".

Iran this month reopened its embassy in Saudi Arabia following a repairing of relations brokered by China in March.

Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi, visiting Nicaragua, ensured June 14 reporting on US-Iran relations included a sour note, when, at a joint appearance in Managua with Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega, he declared: “The United States wanted to paralyse our people with threats and sanctions, but it hasn’t been able to do it.”