Editor’s Note: Ilya Roubanis has previously written for Stimson about outside powers and Syria. Ehsan Dastgheib is an Iran and Middle East Expert at Universidad Autónoma de Madrid.
Vladimir Ivanov is an Adjunct Senior Fellow with Stimson and co-author of the East-West Institute 2009 report “Iran’s Nuclear and Missile Potential: A Joint Threat Assessment by U.S. and Russian Technical Experts.”
By Barbara Slavin, Distinguished Fellow, Middle East Perspectives
Since the first Trump administration withdrew from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) in 2018, developments have fostered a less collective approach to foreign and security policy. The multilateral framework that underpinned earlier negotiations is no longer as relevant.
Russia, China, and the U.K., France, and Germany (the “E-3”) must decide whether to actively support or tacitly accept a bilateral negotiation between Tehran and Washington. Participating in the current context would be a challenge for Moscow given the strategic cooperation agreement it concluded with Tehran in January 2025, which includes elements of military, economic, and “strategic intent” coordination. Still, the urgency to secure a deal is clear for all stakeholders, and none have an interest in standing in the way.
Talks this weekend in Oman are the result of an exchange of letters between U.S. President Donald Trump and Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Trump has pursued an escalating “or else” strategy consistent with the logic of “maximum pressure” since 2018.
Tehran is trying to mitigate the economic and military asymmetry of this bilateral negotiation by escalating its own threats of crossing the nuclear threshold, affirming its technological readiness to weaponize. A discussion between the authors and an Iranian nuclear scientist clarified that even as Iran’s nuclear program is consistent with the objective of generating much-needed energy, the key driver of Iranian nuclear capacity is its implicit transactional value as a bargaining chip to gain relief from onerous U.S. sanctions.
Beyond threats, Iran is open to a more strategic dialogue. An intelligence source close to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) told the authors that Tehran might follow Moscow’s example and hint at a willingness to help the U.S. in Eurasia as Washington prioritizes strategic opposition to China. That offer is still not articulated publicly.
For Washington, the main sense of urgency stems from the need to stop Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons capability. Currently, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) cannot fully monitor Iran’s fissile material enrichment, a consequence of Washington’s withdrawal from the JCPOA. Iran has amassed enough highly enriched uranium to make a half-dozen nuclear weapons. With Israel willing to strike Iran’s facilities unilaterally, Washington needs to resolve the crisis before the room for diplomacy is lost.
Russia also does not want to see Iran pass the nuclear threshold. Dr. Andrei Yevseenko from the Arbatov U.S. and Canada Institute told the authors that “Moscow has no interest in the expansion of the ‘nuclear club’ and nurturing competitors in the Caspian region.”
Above all, Moscow does not want to see its military cooperation with Tehran tested by a collision between Washington and Tehran. In the words of Deputy Foreign Minister Andrey Rudenko, “We would not like Russia to be drawn into resolving yet another conflict.” Dr. Vladimir Sazhin of the Institute of Oriental Studies told the authors that “Moscow sees its role in concluding a nuclear deal with Iran on the basis of the principles laid down in the JCPOA, that is, taking into account not only U.S. views but also those of every participant in the 2015 framework.”
A key attraction of the 2015 framework is that it is consistent with Moscow’s vision of a multipolar world order. However, as Sazhin conceded, “Moscow has no leverage over the Iranian or the U.S. negotiating positions” even as Russia would not obstruct bilateral negotiations it has every interest in seeing succeed.
In February 2025, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov visited Tehran and offered to mediate between the U.S. and Tehran, implicitly recognizing the bilateral framing of negotiations. Most political analysts in Russia did not overstate the significance of Lavrov’s offer, which to some degree was intended to raise eyebrows in Europe and underscore the widening gulf between Washington and the European Union.
First and foremost, however, Moscow wants a resolution. Russia’s Permanent Representative in Vienna, Mikhail Ulyanov, has stated that Moscow considers negotiations with Iran a matter of urgency. There is a firm deadline. On October 18, 2025, the JCPOA framework and the mandate of UN Security Council Resolution 2231 expires. “There is nothing in place of this plan,” Ulyanov notes.
If there is no resolution, European members of the council have threatened to use their power to “snap back” UN sanctions on Iran, which Iran has said would lead to its formal withdrawal from the Non-Proliferation Treaty. Russia, which will chair the council in October, seeks coordination with the E-3 to avert this crisis.
The common sense between Europe and Russia is that increasing sanctions now would be counterproductive, forcing a security crisis without a process to manage one. Therefore, Moscow and the E-3 look to Washington to shoulder the unilateral responsibility it assumed by leaving the JCPOA framework in 2018.
Former Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif—a key architect of the JCPOA — is advising against a public-facing process, which would be politically sensitive for Tehran.
During the transition period from President Trump’s election to the inauguration, the office of Supreme Leader Khamenei authorized the government of President Masoud Pezeshkian to seek an appropriate backchannel with Omani, Qatari, or Iraqi mediation, according to our sources. For the moment, the Omani process is the most tested format, one that has served U.S. administrations for decades.
Another channel is through New York, spearheaded by Iran’s UN Ambassador Saeed Iravani. While Iravani publicly condemns Trump’s “reckless and belligerent” remarks, according to two diplomatic sources in Tehran, the ambassador has been reaching out to the U.S. State Department and Trump associate Elon Musk. Khamenei’s entourage has affirmed Tehran’s willingness to open a back channel, possibly through the leader’s close advisor, former foreign minister Kamal Kharrazi.
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Public opinion in Iran remains relevant, even as the political system is not as competitive as more liberal systems. This adds momentum to the negotiations, as Tehran is under pressure to deliver. Almost two generations after the Islamic Revolution of 1979, anti-Americanism is no longer the politically legitimizing force it used to be. Most Iranians demand a resolution to the 40-plus year crisis with the U.S.
The challenge is systemic. The office of the Supreme Leader needs to carry favor with a hardline political establishment and the IRGC, who are the muscle behind his authority. At the same time, the elected government shields the leader from a rapid depreciation of authority in a country in socioeconomic crisis. According to the editor of Iran’s Foreign Policy Review, Ali Musawi Khalkhali, “the current government’s popular mandate is reliant on a negotiation that holds the promise of alleviating economic pressure linked to sanctions.” As of March 2025, annualized inflation stood at 37 percent, driven by food, housing, and fuel surges. With millions falling below the poverty line, the safest way to escape poverty in Iran is to be a loyal hardliner.
Control over the government without the responsibility for governance is a systemic paradox that permeates every institution. In the words of the reformist dissident Ahmad Zeid Abadi, “If the Islamic Republic wants to lift the country’s economic sanctions through an agreement, it will lose the support of its hardline base” but, “in return, it will gain massive support from diverse segments of society under pressure.”
The mandate to negotiate requires more juggling than balancing. Two Iranian diplomats told the authors that Iran’s negotiator will simultaneously report to the Foreign Ministry and the Supreme National Security Council (SNSC), the top body for coordinating foreign and security policy in Iran. The negotiator’s team will comprise personnel from both institutions and manage objections from either direction. Whether the negotiators will be able to operate as one team is an open question. During the tenure of the late President Ebrahim Raisi, Tehran came tantalizingly close to a deal under negotiations led by Deputy Foreign Minister Ali Bagheri Kani. The hardliner Kani exploited the prior administration’s diplomatic groundwork to reach out to Washington, only to find that his hardline ideological credentials did not shield him from pushback from even harder hardliners. Saeed Jalili, a former – and unsuccessful – nuclear negotiator and the leader of the so-called Endurance Front parliamentary group, rallied allies in the SNSC to undermine Kani’s mandate.
At present, intelligence and diplomatic sources in Tehran told the authors that resistance to Ambassador Iravani’s mandate stems from both the foreign ministry and the hardline security apparatus. Iravani does not report to Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, who is leading talks in Oman this weekend. The foreign minister may hope to share the credit should negotiations lead to positive results, but hardliners will likely obstruct his efforts.
Building a negotiation on such a fragile foundation is not a challenge for the faint at heart. More important than who takes the lead on negotiations is the extent of his mandate. And this does not even touch the question of how flexible U.S. negotiators will be. The remaining parties to the JCPOA are reduced to spectators as political infighting continues in Washington and Tehran.
Ilya Roubanis (PhD) is an area studies expert specializing in Southeast Europe, the South Caucasus, and the Levant. He is a non-resident fellow of the Institute of International Relations in Athens, and a member of the Caucasus Watch editorial team.
Ehsan Dastgheib (PhD) specializes in Middle Eastern and Eurasian diplomacy and political economy. He is a senior member of the Iran and Persian Studies Group at Universidad Autónoma de Madrid.
Vladimir Ivanov is an Adjunct Senior Fellow with the Stimson Center. Prior to joining Stimson in 2021, he worked for 20 years with the EastWest Institute (EWI) in Moscow, focusing on U.S.-Russia relations and international security issues.
Editor’s Note: Ilya Roubanis has previously written for Stimson about outside powers and Syria. Ehsan Dastgheib is an Iran and Middle East Expert at Universidad Autónoma de Madrid.
Vladimir Ivanov is an Adjunct Senior Fellow with Stimson and co-author of the East-West Institute 2009 report “Iran’s Nuclear and Missile Potential: A Joint Threat Assessment by U.S. and Russian Technical Experts.”
By Barbara Slavin, Distinguished Fellow, Middle East Perspectives
Since the first Trump administration withdrew from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) in 2018, developments have fostered a less collective approach to foreign and security policy. The multilateral framework that underpinned earlier negotiations is no longer as relevant.
Russia, China, and the U.K., France, and Germany (the “E-3”) must decide whether to actively support or tacitly accept a bilateral negotiation between Tehran and Washington. Participating in the current context would be a challenge for Moscow given the strategic cooperation agreement it concluded with Tehran in January 2025, which includes elements of military, economic, and “strategic intent” coordination. Still, the urgency to secure a deal is clear for all stakeholders, and none have an interest in standing in the way.
Talks this weekend in Oman are the result of an exchange of letters between U.S. President Donald Trump and Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Trump has pursued an escalating “or else” strategy consistent with the logic of “maximum pressure” since 2018.
Tehran is trying to mitigate the economic and military asymmetry of this bilateral negotiation by escalating its own threats of crossing the nuclear threshold, affirming its technological readiness to weaponize. A discussion between the authors and an Iranian nuclear scientist clarified that even as Iran’s nuclear program is consistent with the objective of generating much-needed energy, the key driver of Iranian nuclear capacity is its implicit transactional value as a bargaining chip to gain relief from onerous U.S. sanctions.
Beyond threats, Iran is open to a more strategic dialogue. An intelligence source close to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) told the authors that Tehran might follow Moscow’s example and hint at a willingness to help the U.S. in Eurasia as Washington prioritizes strategic opposition to China. That offer is still not articulated publicly.
For Washington, the main sense of urgency stems from the need to stop Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons capability. Currently, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) cannot fully monitor Iran’s fissile material enrichment, a consequence of Washington’s withdrawal from the JCPOA. Iran has amassed enough highly enriched uranium to make a half-dozen nuclear weapons. With Israel willing to strike Iran’s facilities unilaterally, Washington needs to resolve the crisis before the room for diplomacy is lost.
Russia also does not want to see Iran pass the nuclear threshold. Dr. Andrei Yevseenko from the Arbatov U.S. and Canada Institute told the authors that “Moscow has no interest in the expansion of the ‘nuclear club’ and nurturing competitors in the Caspian region.”
Above all, Moscow does not want to see its military cooperation with Tehran tested by a collision between Washington and Tehran. In the words of Deputy Foreign Minister Andrey Rudenko, “We would not like Russia to be drawn into resolving yet another conflict.” Dr. Vladimir Sazhin of the Institute of Oriental Studies told the authors that “Moscow sees its role in concluding a nuclear deal with Iran on the basis of the principles laid down in the JCPOA, that is, taking into account not only U.S. views but also those of every participant in the 2015 framework.”
A key attraction of the 2015 framework is that it is consistent with Moscow’s vision of a multipolar world order. However, as Sazhin conceded, “Moscow has no leverage over the Iranian or the U.S. negotiating positions” even as Russia would not obstruct bilateral negotiations it has every interest in seeing succeed.
In February 2025, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov visited Tehran and offered to mediate between the U.S. and Tehran, implicitly recognizing the bilateral framing of negotiations. Most political analysts in Russia did not overstate the significance of Lavrov’s offer, which to some degree was intended to raise eyebrows in Europe and underscore the widening gulf between Washington and the European Union.
First and foremost, however, Moscow wants a resolution. Russia’s Permanent Representative in Vienna, Mikhail Ulyanov, has stated that Moscow considers negotiations with Iran a matter of urgency. There is a firm deadline. On October 18, 2025, the JCPOA framework and the mandate of UN Security Council Resolution 2231 expires. “There is nothing in place of this plan,” Ulyanov notes.
If there is no resolution, European members of the council have threatened to use their power to “snap back” UN sanctions on Iran, which Iran has said would lead to its formal withdrawal from the Non-Proliferation Treaty. Russia, which will chair the council in October, seeks coordination with the E-3 to avert this crisis.
The common sense between Europe and Russia is that increasing sanctions now would be counterproductive, forcing a security crisis without a process to manage one. Therefore, Moscow and the E-3 look to Washington to shoulder the unilateral responsibility it assumed by leaving the JCPOA framework in 2018.
Former Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif—a key architect of the JCPOA — is advising against a public-facing process, which would be politically sensitive for Tehran.
During the transition period from President Trump’s election to the inauguration, the office of Supreme Leader Khamenei authorized the government of President Masoud Pezeshkian to seek an appropriate backchannel with Omani, Qatari, or Iraqi mediation, according to our sources. For the moment, the Omani process is the most tested format, one that has served U.S. administrations for decades.
Another channel is through New York, spearheaded by Iran’s UN Ambassador Saeed Iravani. While Iravani publicly condemns Trump’s “reckless and belligerent” remarks, according to two diplomatic sources in Tehran, the ambassador has been reaching out to the U.S. State Department and Trump associate Elon Musk. Khamenei’s entourage has affirmed Tehran’s willingness to open a back channel, possibly through the leader’s close advisor, former foreign minister Kamal Kharrazi.
Public opinion in Iran remains relevant, even as the political system is not as competitive as more liberal systems. This adds momentum to the negotiations, as Tehran is under pressure to deliver. Almost two generations after the Islamic Revolution of 1979, anti-Americanism is no longer the politically legitimizing force it used to be. Most Iranians demand a resolution to the 40-plus year crisis with the U.S.
The challenge is systemic. The office of the Supreme Leader needs to carry favor with a hardline political establishment and the IRGC, who are the muscle behind his authority. At the same time, the elected government shields the leader from a rapid depreciation of authority in a country in socioeconomic crisis. According to the editor of Iran’s Foreign Policy Review, Ali Musawi Khalkhali, “the current government’s popular mandate is reliant on a negotiation that holds the promise of alleviating economic pressure linked to sanctions.” As of March 2025, annualized inflation stood at 37 percent, driven by food, housing, and fuel surges. With millions falling below the poverty line, the safest way to escape poverty in Iran is to be a loyal hardliner.
Control over the government without the responsibility for governance is a systemic paradox that permeates every institution. In the words of the reformist dissident Ahmad Zeid Abadi, “If the Islamic Republic wants to lift the country’s economic sanctions through an agreement, it will lose the support of its hardline base” but, “in return, it will gain massive support from diverse segments of society under pressure.”
The mandate to negotiate requires more juggling than balancing. Two Iranian diplomats told the authors that Iran’s negotiator will simultaneously report to the Foreign Ministry and the Supreme National Security Council (SNSC), the top body for coordinating foreign and security policy in Iran. The negotiator’s team will comprise personnel from both institutions and manage objections from either direction. Whether the negotiators will be able to operate as one team is an open question. During the tenure of the late President Ebrahim Raisi, Tehran came tantalizingly close to a deal under negotiations led by Deputy Foreign Minister Ali Bagheri Kani. The hardliner Kani exploited the prior administration’s diplomatic groundwork to reach out to Washington, only to find that his hardline ideological credentials did not shield him from pushback from even harder hardliners. Saeed Jalili, a former – and unsuccessful – nuclear negotiator and the leader of the so-called Endurance Front parliamentary group, rallied allies in the SNSC to undermine Kani’s mandate.
At present, intelligence and diplomatic sources in Tehran told the authors that resistance to Ambassador Iravani’s mandate stems from both the foreign ministry and the hardline security apparatus. Iravani does not report to Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, who is leading talks in Oman this weekend. The foreign minister may hope to share the credit should negotiations lead to positive results, but hardliners will likely obstruct his efforts.
Building a negotiation on such a fragile foundation is not a challenge for the faint at heart. More important than who takes the lead on negotiations is the extent of his mandate. And this does not even touch the question of how flexible U.S. negotiators will be. The remaining parties to the JCPOA are reduced to spectators as political infighting continues in Washington and Tehran.
Ilya Roubanis (PhD) is an area studies expert specializing in Southeast Europe, the South Caucasus, and the Levant. He is a non-resident fellow of the Institute of International Relations in Athens, and a member of the Caucasus Watch editorial team.
Ehsan Dastgheib (PhD) specializes in Middle Eastern and Eurasian diplomacy and political economy. He is a senior member of the Iran and Persian Studies Group at Universidad Autónoma de Madrid.
Vladimir Ivanov is an Adjunct Senior Fellow with the Stimson Center. Prior to joining Stimson in 2021, he worked for 20 years with the EastWest Institute (EWI) in Moscow, focusing on U.S.-Russia relations and international security issues.
