Washington and Tehran to hold more nuclear talks as protests reignite in Iran

Iran and the US are expected to meet for a further round of talks in Geneva this week in a sign that Donald Trump’s team believes Tehran is making serious proposals to dilute its stockpile of highly enriched uranium and show it is not seeking a nuclear weapon.As fears loomed of renewed conflict after Washington carried out a major redeployment of military assets to the region, the Iranian foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, said he thought there was still a good chance of finding a diplomatic solution.He told CBS that negotiators would probably meet on Thursday to discuss and try to make “a fast deal”. Alluding to US assets in the region as potential targets, however, he said: “If the US attacks us, then we have every right to defend ourselves.”The Iranian government, which is suspicious Trump could perform a diplomatic volte-face at any moment by sanctioning a full-scale attack, is also coming under renewed pressure within the country.Student demonstrations at universities in Tehran and the north-eastern city of Mashhad continued for a second day on Sunday, and videos from the latter suggest clashes between students and the state-backed Basij militia turned violent.The universities had reopened on Saturday for the first time since the protests in December and January that led to thousands of deaths, and many of the students had returned to university determined to commemorate those killed and injured.The true number of deaths during the previous unrest is unclear. The government puts the figure at just over 3,000, but human rights groups say a minimum of 6,000.The government has refused to allow a UN-led fact-finding committee to enter the country, insisting its own internal inquiry is sufficient. Iran’s deputy foreign minister, Kazem Gharibabadi, is scheduled to speak at the UN human rights council this week, a move that is likely to lead to large-scale walk outs by other delegates.Trump had initially supported the protesters vocally, telling them “help is on its way” and appearing to threaten to intervene militarily. In recent weeks, however, his focus has shifted to Iran’s nuclear programme as Washington builds a large military presence in the region.An F-35C jet preparing to launch from the USS Abraham Lincoln in the Arabian Sea. Photograph: Seaman Daniel Kimmelman/US Navy/AFP/Getty ImagesTrump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff said at the weekend that the US president was questioning why Iran had not yet given in to US pressure. “He’s curious as to why they haven’t ... I don’t want to use the word ‘capitulated’, but why they haven’t capitulated,” he told Fox News.“Why, under this pressure, with the amount of seapower and naval power over there, why haven’t they come to us and said ‘we profess we don’t want a weapon, so here’s what we’re prepared to do’?”Iran’s negotiating position is that it should retain the right to enrich uranium for peaceful purposes under a new verification regime controlled by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the UN’s nuclear inspectorate. Iran would be required to dilute its stockpile of highly enriched uranium, allow the IAEA full access to its bombed nuclear sites and in return would be given sanctions relief.As a result, those in the US Republican party calling for Trump to bomb Iran, such as the senator Lindsey Graham, are losing ground. For Trump, however, the main political challenge lies in portraying any new deal as superior to the landmark 2015 agreement that the Democrats negotiated and he pulled out of in 2018 during his first term as president.Araghchi told CBS elements of a new deal could be an improvement on the previous one without being as detailed, because it would commit to Iran’s nuclear programme being “peaceful for ever”. The 2015 deal was time-limited.In practice, experts say, Iran might be left with a right in principle to enrich uranium for nuclear power generation, but its practical capacity to do so would be strictly limited.US officials believe Iran’s supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, and the country’s president, Masoud Pezeshkian, are becoming increasingly sidelined from the negotiations. They believe Araghchi and the chair of the supreme national security council, Ali Larijani, are leading the strategy.The extent of Pezeshkian’s political irrelevance has been underlined by the mass arrest of his closest supporters in the Reformists Front coalition, an umbrella group instrumental in securing his election in 2024, many of whose members are in jail or face charges of supporting foreign interests.Some have been released on bail, but remain furious that they face charges of siding with the enemy for having criticised the military and security services over their crackdown on the protests. Precise information on how many are in jail or face charges is patchy.Two of the front’s leading figures – Ebrahim Asgharzadeh, the head of its political committee, and Javad Imam, a spokesperson, were released on bail after three and four days in prison respectively.Its head, Azar Mansouri, who is also the secretary general of the Union of Islamic Iran People party, , has also been released on bail.