Rubio: Iran Talks Continue, Nuclear Program on the Table
Washington insists the channel with Tehran is not closed, while Iranian media claim otherwise; a memorandum proposes 60 days of calm and reopening Hormuz.
- Rubio and Trump say the United States remains in talks with Iran to end the war, despite Iranian denials.
- Rubio says Iran may also be negotiating over aspects of its nuclear program.
- A memorandum proposes 60 days of halted violence and the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz without tolls.
- Vice President Vance says it is hard to say when Trump will sign, as the wording is still being agreed.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on June 2 that talks between Washington and Tehran on ending the war are still under way, even though Iranian media claim there has been no exchange of messages for several days. For Serbia, which measures its energy stability through the price of oil on world markets, any movement around the Strait of Hormuz is not distant news but a question that reaches the petrol pump.
Rubio and President Donald Trump on the same day rejected a claim by the Iranian agency Fars that the diplomatic channel had gone quiet. On the contrary, the American side insists the process is alive and can be accelerated. From Tehran the message runs the other way, and that gap between two versions of the same exchange has itself become part of the negotiation.
What exactly is the US offering Iran?
Before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Rubio said there is a prospect that Iran is also negotiating over parts of its nuclear program, and that a breakthrough could come today, tomorrow or next week. With that, American diplomacy for the first time openly tied a ceasefire to its most sensitive issue, the one around uranium enrichment.
The backbone of the discussions is a memorandum of understanding whose outlines are known. It envisions three concrete steps:
- a 60-day halt to violence between the warring sides,
- the opening of the Strait of Hormuz to shipping, with no tolls levied,
- the removal of Iranian mines from that waterway within 30 days.
It is hard to say when the president will sign, because the wording is still being agreed.
That, according to the American account, is how Vice President James David Vance described the situation, making clear that the deal is not yet closed and that the text is not final. Hormuz is not in the heart of the memorandum by accident. Through that narrow passage between Iran and Oman flows a fifth of the world’s oil, so any threat to close it immediately raises the risk premium on the price of crude.
Why do the two sides disagree even over the facts?
That very disagreement brings us back to our earlier story. Only days ago we wrote about the Iranian threat that Hormuz could be closed, and now that same point on the map becomes the central concession in the draft accord. Two capitals send their citizens two opposing pictures of the same table: Washington speaks of opening, Tehran at times of closing.
For an observer in Belgrade this gap is no mere diplomatic technicality. With the American and Iranian flags on opposite sides of the negotiating room, one message goes to the home audience, another to international partners. Serbia, which imports oil and watches its price form thousands of kilometres away, has a direct interest in keeping Hormuz open and in seeing the 60 days of calm amount to more than ink on paper.
One question will shadow every statement from Washington and Tehran in the coming weeks: will a signature reach the memorandum before the last thread of the talks snaps? And do you believe the 60 days of calm will really begin to count down?
