Despite U.S. President Donald Trump’s sunny assessment of the prospects for a long-term peace agreement with Iran, fundamental differences remain between the two sides’ visions for a deal.
Trump has described Iran’s 10-point plan as “a workable basis on which to negotiate,” but questions remain about what exactly it contains and whether it crosses U.S. red lines.
Iranian state media have reported that the plan would allow Iran to maintain its ability to enrich uranium, protect Tehran’s allied militant groups in the Middle East, including Hezbollah and Hamas, and secure the withdrawal of U.S. combat troops from bases in the region.
However, U.S. Vice-President JD Vance denies that this is the plan Trump was describing as workable.
Whatever the latest Iranian proposal that helped pave the way for the Pakistan-brokered ceasefire contains, the 15-point framework the U.S. put forward through mediators last month calls on Tehran to end its uranium enrichment program and stop supporting its proxy militants, while making no provision for any U.S. troop withdrawal, according to a range of media reports.
Other apparent differences between the two sides include whether Israel’s invasion of Lebanon is covered by the ceasefire and whether Iran has the right to charge ships for safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz.
The U.S. and Iran have agreed to a two-week ceasefire contingent on the Strait of Hormuz reopening as well as work towards a permanent end to attacks. The deal came hours after U.S. President Donald Trump threatened to wipe out a ‘whole civilization.’
Jennifer Kavanagh, director of military analysis at Defense Priorities, a think-tank in Washington, D.C., says she is not very optimistic about the prospects for a lasting peace deal.
“The two plans are diametrically opposed,” Kavanagh told CBC News Network on Wednesday. “These plans don’t even resemble each other in any way, and I find it really difficult to see how they’re going to come together.”
Leavitt calls Iran’s proposal ‘reasonable’
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt says the latest proposal from Iran that paved the way for the ceasefire was “more reasonable and entirely different” from the 10-point plan it originally put on the table.
“The idea that President Trump would ever accept an Iranian wish list as a deal is completely absurd,” Leavitt told a news conference on Wednesday
“What Iran says publicly or feeds to all of you in the press is much different than what they communicate to the United States, the president and his team privately.”
Here is a look at the issues likely to be the main sticking points in reaching an agreement to end the war.
Iran’s nuclear program
Since U.S. claims that Iran was moving to build nuclear weapons were at the heart of Trump’s stated rationale for launching the war, it is no surprise that finding common ground on this issue will be a challenge.
Tehran’s proposal calls for the U.S. to accept Iran’s right to enrich uranium.
“There will be no enrichment of Uranium,” Trump declared in a Truth Social post on Wednesday.
A separate question remains over what will happen to the 440 kilograms of uranium that the International Atomic Energy Agency says Iran has already enriched to a high level and that is believed to be buried beneath nuclear sites the U.S. bombed last June.
Trump’s post said that the U.S. will work with Iran to “dig up and remove” the highly enriched uranium and that the material has been monitored by satellite and “nothing has been touched” since the bomb strikes.
Vance told reporters in Budapest on Wednesday before boarding a flight from the Hungarian capital that Iran needs to keep in mind that it could obtain sanctions relief through the negotiations.
“That’s not going to happen unless the Iranians make a firm commitment to stop anything close to the development of a nuclear weapon,” Vance said.
Strait of Hormuz
The ending of Tehran’s blockade of the Strait of Hormuz was the red line behind Trump’s threat to bomb Iranian power plants and bridges.
The ceasefire is conditional on what Trump called the “complete, immediate and safe opening” of the strait to commercial shipping.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi has said safe passage during the ceasefire will be possible only “via co-ordination with Iran’s armed forces.” The regime has also proposed collecting a fee of $2 million US per ship, according to reporting by the New York Times.
Iranian state media says the country has again closed the Strait of Hormuz, this time over Israel’s continued attacks on Lebanon. The U.S. and Israel say Lebanon is not part of the ceasefire agreement — and the White House claims the Strait remains open.
Richard Nephew, a former U.S. deputy special envoy for Iran, says the Islamic regime does not appear to be willing to make major concessions.
“There’s no indication from the Iranians that they’re prepared to accept a return to the previous status quo with respect to the Strait of Hormuz,” Nephew told CBC News Network.
Nephew says it is possible Iran’s stated plan for the strait is just bluster, but he says it is consistent with the regime’s position that “nobody’s going to sell oil if Iran can’t sell oil freely.”
Israel vs. Hezbollah in Lebanon
The first day of the Iran ceasefire became the deadliest day of Israel’s parallel war with the Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah.
The Lebanese Civil Defense says a total of 254 people were killed and more than 1,100 wounded in Israeli strikes across the country, including strikes on busy commercial and residential areas in central Beirut, Reuters reported.
Israel’s ramped up attacks on Hezbollah suggest how difficult it will be for the U.S. and Tehran to reach an agreement, with Iran demanding that its allied militant groups be left alone and the U.S. calling for the Islamic regime to end its support of them.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel backed the U.S. ceasefire with Iran but that the deal doesn’t cover fighting against Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Although Iran maintains the ceasefire is supposed to apply to the conflict between Israel and Hezbollah, the Trump administration and the government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu say it does not.
Iran said it closed the Strait of Hormuz on Wednesday in response to the Israeli strikes in Lebanon.
Vance says Iran misunderstood the scope of the ceasefire.
“I think the Iranians thought that the ceasefire included Lebanon, and it just didn’t. We never made that promise,” Vance said.
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