Arabic version: فجوة الثقة تعرقل المفاوضات بين إيران والولايات المتحدة

According to Al Jazeera, repeated United States-Iran negotiation initiatives have foundered because each side approaches diplomacy through deeply rooted distrust shaped by past crises. Only a memorandum of understanding signed in Islamabad on June 18 was concluded, but it collapsed within days.

The analysis traces Iran’s mistrust to the 1953 overthrow of Mohammad Mosaddegh’s government, backed by US and British intelligence agencies, and to Washington’s 2018 withdrawal from the nuclear agreement despite International Atomic Energy Agency confirmation that Tehran was complying. It says Tehran now seeks binding guarantees and relief from pressure before making concessions.

Washington’s position is linked to the 1979 US embassy siege in Tehran, when 52 Americans were held for 444 days after Iranian students stormed the mission. The resulting approach requires Iran to act first, with its concessions verified before US commitments follow.

Recent proposals reflected those opposing priorities. US plans sought steps including a freeze in uranium enrichment before sanctions relief, while Iranian proposals called for assurances against renewed war, a UN Security Council resolution and the lifting of sanctions or a naval blockade before Iranian action.

The Islamabad memorandum briefly addressed concerns on both sides, combining provisions on Iran’s enriched uranium stockpile with sanctions relief, monitoring, mutual sovereignty and possible UN Security Council approval. But Tehran later suspended participation in Geneva talks, citing the absence of a ceasefire in Lebanon. The dispute had shifted by late September toward the sequence of steps rather than their substance, the analysis said.