Iran's ex-FM Zarif blames talks failure on US push to 'dictate' terms

TEHRAN: Iran’s former foreign minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, who led his country’s delegation in 2015 nuclear talks, on Sunday blamed the failure of negotiations to end the Middle East war on US attempts to “dictate” its terms.

“No negotiations – at least with Iran – will succeed based on ‘our/your terms’,” said Zarif, one of the architects of the nuclear deal with the United States and other world powers, which was abandoned in 2018 by US President Donald Trump.

“The US must learn: you can’t dictate terms to Iran. It’s not too late to learn. Yet,” added Zarif in a post on X.

On Saturday, senior American and Iranian officials held peace talks in Pakistan, as a fragile two-week ceasefire held.

After the talks failed, US news website Axios quoted an unnamed source briefed on the negotiations as saying that disagreements included “Iran’s demand to control the Strait of Hormuz and refusal to give up on its enriched uranium stockpile.”

US Vice President JD Vance, who led his country’s delegation, said at a press conference Sunday that the talks lasted around 21 hours and that Iran had “chosen not to accept our terms”.

Iran’s foreign ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baqaei said the two sides had agreed on some points but that “differences remained on two or three important issues.”

Iran has been at war since the United States and Israel’s February 28 strikes killed the Islamic Republic’s supreme leader Ali Khamenei, triggering a conflict that spread across the Middle East.

It was not immediately clear whether the two sides would resume contacts, or what would happen to the ceasefire after talks failed.