Indirect US–Iran Nuclear Talks Open in Oman (Full Transcript)

[00:00:00] Speaker 1: Welcome to the Global News Podcast on YouTube, where we go behind the headlines of a story and tell you why it really matters. Hello, I'm Ankur Dasan, and today we are breaking down the US and Iran talks, which have been taking place in Amman. They've concluded for the day and they were indirect with officials from both sides being represented. The key question, can military action be averted? Now to dive into this one, I've got our diplomatic correspondent, Caroline Hawley with me. Caroline, key question then, what would have been at the top of the agenda today?

[00:00:31] Speaker 2: Well, we know what's on the top of the US agenda, and that is not the mass killing of protesters last month, which is when Donald Trump said that help was on its way. But now the focus has been on Iran's nuclear programme, and the White House has said zero nuclear capability. That is what it wanted and wants, and that is foremost in its mind. That is also what Iran has wanted, to discuss only the nuclear programme, not the host of other concerns that the US has, which are the range of its ballistic weapons and also its support for militant groups around the Middle East. But I'm not sure that any of this was on the agenda today. As far as we know, and this is what the Omanis have said, who are mediating, that they are just setting the stage, if you want. These are preparations being made for what they call technical and diplomatic negotiations. But the two sides did not actually meet each other directly. So we know that the Iranian foreign minister met with the Omani foreign minister, who then met with the Middle East envoy, the US Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff, and we think Jared Kushner as well, Donald Trump's son-in-law. The Omani foreign minister then met with the Iranian foreign minister again, and shortly after that, the talk seemed to have ended with an agreement to talk again, but we don't yet know the format. We don't know exactly when, and I think what's clear is this is what Iran would have wanted. It wants to kind of string these along by some time.

[00:02:10] Speaker 1: And they managed to get their talks to be in Oman rather than Turkey, which was initially the location they were going to have the chat.

[00:02:18] Speaker 2: And this still actually surprises me to some extent, because regional countries, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Qatar, Oman, and Egypt have all been involved in trying to calm things down because they don't want a confrontation that could lead to a war. So our understanding was originally the idea was that the talks would take place in Turkey. But Iran didn't want that, Iran didn't want that because it didn't want to be negotiating with the region as well as the Americans. So it was more comfortable with this format that we've seen in Oman. But what I'm a bit surprised by is why everyone agreed to that, because everyone says, and the U.S. has said itself, the regime is at its weakest. It's never been weaker since it came to power in 1979 in that revolution. So but anyway, in a sense, they won. They got the talks in Oman. We know very little about what happened. What we do know, though, from some Iranians inside Iran is that they are upset and they think that just the mere fact of the talks taking place and a red carpet being rolled out in the Omani capital, Muscat, talks in a palace, that gives legitimacy to a regime that murdered so many of its own people in January. We still don't know the exact number. I think it's the most reliable organization that's been counting the number of dead, has almost 7,000 protesters killed. But there are thousands of other deaths under review. But it is an awful lot of people. And there is concern within Iran that these talks have been taking place at all, given what happened. So there's some kind of reward.

[00:04:07] Speaker 1: Yeah. And that's what's going to be difficult to digest for so many people. And then I wanted to ask you, then, who holds the cards? But what you're saying today is Iran have had a positive day in their eyes. But then from the U.S. point of view, what would they want?

[00:04:23] Speaker 2: I think the Iranian regime will definitely want to kind of string this out for as long as possible. I think the main preoccupation for the Iranian regime at the moment is its own survival. It is terribly weakened. So amassed against it from the outside is what Donald Trump has called that massive armada in the Middle East.

[00:04:47] Speaker 1: Yeah, that shadow looms large still, doesn't it?

[00:04:50] Speaker 2: Exactly. And that will be certainly concentrating mines. But still, we're seeing quite sort of defiant language from the Iranian regime. And they've said if hit, they will hit back. And that's why regional countries are so concerned. And I think for the Americans, what are they thinking? They have so many concerns about Iran. But in a way, there are no very easy options. Of course, there could be a military strike. But to rid the world, to rid Iran of the current regime, you probably need to do much more than strike from the air. So difficult choices for the Americans. And for the moment, they seem to be talking, they seem to be very keen to pursue this diplomatic track. But the White House has said that Donald Trump has many options other than diplomacy. So that threat is hanging over everything that happens next.

[00:05:47] Speaker 1: That's before we even talk about the ballistics programme, which the US want Iran to descale as well. And also a big question of Israel as well, and the role that they play in this. And I guess the distrust from both sides when it comes to Israel, what sort of a role they play in this geopolitical situation?

[00:06:07] Speaker 2: Well, it was interesting because the Middle East envoy, Steve Whitcoff, went to speak to Israeli officials earlier in the week. Israel has always wanted the end of Iran's nuclear programme. And of course, there was the war last June, when Israel attacked Iranian military facilities and ballistic missiles programmes, as well as nuclear facilities. And then the US joined those attacks, and particularly on the three key nuclear sites that are central to Iran's nuclear programme. So that's what Israel would like most. But I think everyone in the Middle East is thinking, how do you reach that outcome? How do you make sure that Iran doesn't try surreptitiously to continue a nuclear programme? And I think that what some of the regional negotiators were talking about was limiting the nuclear programme so Iran, at least for some time, doesn't enrich any more uranium. But then maybe it does at a lower level at some later point. But then there's also the stock of highly enriched uranium that it has, and no one knows exactly where that is and whether that could go to a third country. These are all things that will be talked about, but down the road, and we don't know when the next round of negotiations will be at the moment. And it's too much to call them negotiations. We've just seen these separate talks between the Omani foreign minister and the two sides.

[00:07:40] Speaker 1: Let's finish off then with a possible look into your crystal ball, with all your knowledge and understanding of this region. What could be the possible outcomes when we look into the future? People talk about regime change. Very difficult. People talk about a forced compromise or a controlled war. At the heart of all of this, the Iranian people and what they want and how we can possibly understand what they're going through and what they essentially need when all these talks are finished.

[00:08:14] Speaker 2: I think what the vast majority of Iranians, and of course there are no public opinion polls taking place there, what they want is an end to the regime. That is why we saw that nationwide uprising. Protests were in every corner of the country and large numbers of people, whole families going out into the streets, in some cases attacking hated symbols of the regime, including mosques. That's the level of kind of hatred there is of the regime among so many Iranians. But also what you saw is the Iranian regime being able to put down those protests with brutal force in every corner of the country. There weren't the defections that you would need to see, large scale defections to actually deliver a final blow to the regime. So it's very hard to see what happens next. And of course, the American military strikes are still very much on the agenda. So we wait to see how Iran kind of responds in the negotiations at the moment. We've got both sides, I think, going back to their respective capitals to decide on the next steps.

[00:09:24] Speaker 1: Caroline, thank you so much for your time. Really appreciate it. Caroline Hawley, our diplomatic correspondent, will be sure to revisit this subject again with Caroline when we know about the next set of talks to take place. Now, if you do enjoy world stories like this one, do check out our Global News podcast. You can download that from wherever you get your podcasts from. And do like and subscribe to this video. And if you want to let us know if there are any other stories that you want us to cover, get in touch with us below and leave a comment. Thanks so much for your time. I'll do another version because that was a bit mumbo-jumbo at the end. Caroline, thank you so much for your time. Really appreciate that. Caroline Hawley, our diplomatic correspondent, will be sure to revisit this subject again when we know more about the next round of talks. Thanks so much for watching today. If you do enjoy world stories like this, check out our Global News podcast. You can download that from wherever you get your podcasts from. Do like and subscribe to this video too. And drop us a comment below if there's anything else you'd like us to cover. For now, thank you so much for your company.