According to a U.S. official and the other sources, United States Envoy Steve Witkoff and Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi have been in contact recently. It’s not clear how their communication started, but the first contact between the two started about 2 weeks ago. 

Araghchi denied this, saying, “My last contact with Mr. Witkoff was prior to his employer’s decision to kill diplomacy with another illegal military attack on Iran. Any claim to the contrary appears geared solely to mislead oil traders and the public.” Witkoff claimed that he was lying and Witkoff’s the one who first initiated contact. The text messages are said to be focused about ending the war, but neither side has gone into great detail about the messages. 

President Donald Trump said he is unsure if Araghchi is authorized to make a deal for Iran with the United States. It does seem like Iran’s Foreign minister is coordinating with the secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, Ali Larijani, who has been Iran’s main civilian leader since the Supreme Leader’s assassination. Araghchi is also the go-to person to negotiate with because he is one of the few government officials alive who has preexisting relationships with the US.  

President Trump had told reporters that, “They want to make a deal. They are talking to our people…we have people wanting to negotiate, [but] we have no idea who they are.” He did say he is not opposed to talking about a deal with the Iranians “because sometimes good things come out of it.” He also said he’s unsure who is making decisions for Iran because many top officials are dead, mentioning how Iran’s new supreme leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, hasn’t been seen in a while and could potentially be dead. A senior U.S. official was not open to a peace deal with Iran, but said Trump was open to a deal that would let Iran “integrate with the rest of the world and make money from their oil.”

The senior official said,”The president is always open to a deal. But he’s not negotiating from a position of weakness. He’s not backing away from the reasons this conflict started.” Iranian officials have recently stated that they will not hold any ceasefire negotiations with the Trump administration. They said that they do not want any temporary ceasefire deal, as that could allow the United States and Israel to regroup and come up with a plan to attack again. They would only accept a permanent ceasefire deal that guarantees peace and no more attacks on them.