‘Great.’ US envoy appears to respond to Iran FM tweet Iran will never pursue nukes
US Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff appeared to respond positively to the tweet by the Iranian diplomat, but later deleted it. The exchange came after an exchange of letters between Trump & Iran.
Even as the Pentagon announced that a second carrier strike group would be deployed to the Middle East region, the Trump administration showed signs of interest in pursuing diplomacy with Iran.
US Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff on Wednesday appeared to respond to a tweet by Iran’s foreign minister which asserted that Iran would never seek to develop a nuclear weapon.
“Iran reaffirms that under no circumstances will Iran ever seek, develop or acquire any nuclear weapons,” Iranian Foreign Minister Seyed Abbas Araghchi wrote on Twitter on Tuesday.
“Great,” Witkoff’s personal Twitter account responded to Araghchi’s tweet on Wednesday afternoon, before the post was deleted about an hour later.
A U.S. official subsequently claimed to a journalist colleague that Witkoff had not written the tweet. (“It was not him,” the US official said. “Hence, it has been deleted.”) The U.S. official’s comment did not indicate if the claim was that it had been written by someone else who has access to Witkoff’s personal Twitter account, or if it was trying to imply that the account had been hacked.
But it struck others that Witkoff had probably written the tweet, then he or other administration officials had thought better of it, possibly worried it might draw unwanted attention, including from those opposed to the attempted outreach.
A national security expert who saw Witkoff’s tweet before it was deleted said he was in touch with administration contacts after it appeared, asking them if it might indicate that the US was going to try to pursue diplomacy with Iran.
He said shortly after his queries, the tweet was deleted.
He said he had little doubt that Witkoff did post the tweet.
“I don't have any doubt that that was what happened,” the expert said. “Why he deleted it, I can only speculate.”
Trump, Iran exchange letters
Iran last week formally responded to Trump’s letter to Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, sending their response letter on March 27 via the Omanis. Trump’s letter to Khamenei had been delivered to Iran by Emirati diplomat Anwar Gargash on March 12.
Neither Trump’s letter nor the Iranian response have yet been made public. But Iranian officials have indicated that their response said Iran would be willing to pursue indirect negotiations on the nuclear issue with the United States, mediated by Oman. Iran would not engage in direct talks with the US under the threat of military force or maximum economic pressure, they said.
“The future of the talks depends on U.S. behavior,” Iranian President Masoud Pezezshkian was cited by Iranian journalist Abas Aslani on Sunday. “They have received our response...which rejects direct talks, but deems indirect talks an option. Iran has never avoided negotiations, but US breaches have caused problems. We need to rebuild trust.”
Former Iranian national security advisor Ali Shamkhani, an advisor to Khamenei, said the Iranian response to Trump’s letter is “restrained,” and “signals readiness for indirect talks,” Aslani reported. Shamkhani and other Iranian officials seemed to hint that if Washington took some unspecified confidence-building gestures, then Iran might be willing to engage in direct talks.
“If talks are on an equal footing, Iran will be ready to take the next steps in the talks,” he said, according to Aslani.
A US official suggested today that Washington was considering next steps to include “trust building” with the Iranians.
“After the exchange of letters, we are now exploring next steps in order to begin conversations and trust-building with the Iranians,” a U.S. official told Axios.
Twitter diplomacy
Araghchi’s tweet on Tuesday asserting that Iran would never pursue a nuclear weapon “was actually a very strong affirmation that, if the goal is no nuclear weapon, it’s a goal that both Iran and the US can agree on, and that provides a basis for a negotiation,” Trita Parsi, executive vice president of the Quincy Institute, told me.
“Diplomatic engagement worked in the past and can still work,” Araghchi’s April 1st tweet continued. “BUT, it should be clear to all that there is…no such thing as a ‘military option’ let alone a military solution.”
Asked about the Iranian and American official comments suggesting consideration of possible trust-building steps that could possibly make way for direct talks, Parsi said he worried that could take time the diplomatic process didn’t have.
“There’s not much time,” Parsi said. “They need to quickly get to a framework agreement.”
“The only confidence-building measure I think that would actually work for both sides is just clarity of what is on the table, and what is not on the table,” Parsi said. “If they can agree on that, and what kind of demands are outside the scope, I think they have a chance of getting to a deal.”
Witkoff showed interest in pursuing Iran diplomacy during transition
In conversations between members of the incoming Trump and outgoing Biden national security teams during the US presidential transition earlier this year, Trump’s designated Middle East envoy Witkoff asked questions indicating interest in pursuing diplomacy with Iran, a person speaking on a not for attribution basis said last week. This person said he thought if it was up to Witkoff, he’d be willing to go to Tehran.
“I think they’re going to take a shot at getting” an Iran nuclear deal, the person said, referring to the Trump administration. “And I think you can see Steve Witkoff show up in Tehran, actually.”
The person indicated that two major constraints on any such attempted turbo-charged US-Iran diplomacy would be Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and Iran’s Supreme Leader Khamenei.
The Israeli premier doesn’t want to see a longer, stronger Iran nuclear deal, the person said. The Trump administration will be under heavy lobbying pressure from the Israeli government to pursue military action against Iran, as the Biden administration did towards the end of its term, he said.
The U.S. intelligence community assessed last month that Iran is not building a nuclear weapon. But it added, there was more public discourse in Iran about the issue, including as several of Iran’s regional proxies like Lebanese Hezbollah have been severely weakened over the past year in Israeli military operations following the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas massacres in Israel.
“We continue to assess Iran is not building a nuclear weapon, and that Khamenei has not reauthorized the nuclear weapons program he suspended in 2003, though pressure has probably built on him to do so,” the U.S. intelligence community wrote in its annual worldwide threat assessment, published in March.
“In the past year, there has been an erosion of a decades-long taboo on discussing nuclear weapons in public that has emboldened nuclear weapons advocates within Iran’s decision-making apparatus,” the U.S. intelligence assessment continued.
(Photo: Screenshot of Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi’s April 1st tweet asserting that Iran would never develop or acquire nuclear weapons, and US Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff’s account responding ‘Great,’ on April 2, before being deleted. Posted by @nima6283)
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