Washington (AP) – President Donald Trump appeared on Monday to undermine a proposal proposed by his special envoy to Iran, saying that Tehran was completely dismantled his nuclear enrichment program as part of any transaction to relieve the crush of sanctions.
Trump and Steve Vikof, who has led the US negotiations, have repeatedly offered inconsistent public communications about whether Iran would be allowed to maintain the ability to enrich Uranus at a lower level for civil purposes. The Trump administration maintains that it will not allow Iran to develop a nuclear weapon.
The negotiations are placed by Trump as the best chance of both sides to avoid a direct military conflict for Iran’s nuclear program. Tehran, who denies looking for a nuclear weapon, insisted that he would not agree to any transaction that completely emphasizes the enrichment program.
“According to our potential agreement – we will not allow uranium enrichment!” Trump writes on social media. The White House has not been developed in the post.
Trump’s post comes after media reports that Vicoff’s last proposal for Tehran will allow Iran to maintain low levels of enrichment for civil uses such as nuclear medicine and commercial power if he agrees to close his strongly protected underground sites for a certain period of time. The US and Iran have participated in several rounds of direct nuclear negotiations for the first time in years.
Senior officials – including Vitcof and Trump himself – have said in the last few weeks that Iran will not be able to continue to enrich uranium at every level.
The proposal, reported by AXIOS and confirmed by two US officials, called for the establishment of a regional consortium to deal with the enrichment of uranium for civil use – a plan that was first studied more than a decade ago in the negotiations that led to the nuclear transaction in Iran in 2015.
Trump was sharply critical of this agreement – which also allowed certain restrictions on uranium enrichment, but allowed Iran to maintain such capacity – and withdrew the United States from it in 2017 during its first term.
Officials spoke to the Associated Press provided anonymity to discuss private diplomatic negotiations.
The International Atomic Energy Agency found that Iran further increased its Uranus stocks, enriched to almost weapons levels since its last update in February, according to a confidential report published by the UN nuclear guard on Saturday.
Iran claims that his nuclear program is only for peaceful purposes, but Iranian officials are increasingly suggesting that Tehran can pursue an atomic bomb.
“President Trump has made it clear that Iran could never get a nuclear bomb,” White House secretary Carolyn Levitt said in a statement before Trump. “The special envoy Vitcof sent a detailed and acceptable proposal to the Iranian regime and in their interest it is to accept it. From respect for the current transaction, the administration will not comment on details of the proposal to the media.”
The proposal, which Trump seems to be undergoing on Monday night, included significant discounts on the administration, sure to anger Israel with the pro-Israeli legislators in the United States.
Several of the main points were essentially the same or very similar to the conditions outlined in the 2015 nuclear transaction.
The early iterations of this agreement, agreed by the Obama Administration, also offered the possibility of a regional consortium to place the Iranian enrichment of Uranus over a certain level under the control of Iran and its neighbors. However, the idea was defective because of the objections of the Arab nations of the Persian Gulf and the Iranian suspicion of the ultimate goals of the consortium.
People who participated in the 18-month 2015 deal negotiations responded immediately to reports that the Trump administration could allow Iran to continue with an enrichment program at any level, especially after senior officials repeatedly stated that Iran would not be able to retain such programs.
“This proposal puts a moment for the critics of previous Iranian nuclear negotiations/agreements (s) those who have called for recklessness, a deal with a full dysmantia,” Does Dan Shapiro, the former Obama ambassador to Israel, wrote to X. “Will they hold Trump for the same standard?”