Iran has conveyed conditions to Washington through Qatari mediators to end the war with the United States, the secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council told Al Jazeera on Saturday. Tehran is awaiting a response from President Donald Trump.
The demands are an end to the war on all fronts, the release of Iran’s frozen funds and the lifting of the US naval blockade, Mohsen Rezaei said. “It is in Washington’s interest to accept these conditions. Trump’s threats will not achieve any results. We are prepared for a decisive war.”
Qatar and Pakistan have worked to restart negotiations since a memorandum of understanding between the two sides expired last month.
Rezaei did not rule out a fresh US strike, describing the possibility as “very much on the cards.” He said Iranian military planning had shifted toward US naval assets stretching from the Gulf to the Gulf of Oman and the Arabian Sea, and that Iran had recently test-fired a multi-warhead antiship missile near a US vessel or aircraft carrier. He said any future response would encompass US bases in the region as well as US commercial interests operating locally.
David Des Roches, a former Pentagon director of Arabian Peninsula affairs, told Al Jazeera that Washington was unlikely to treat the terms as a serious opening, saying they “would be viewed as surrender.” He noted, however, that Iran had dropped an earlier demand for war reparations, a sign of movement.
The conditions come as regional escalation pushed oil prices above $100 per barrel. Iran has also launched a mass mobilisation drive, raising fears of renewed conflict.
On the nuclear file, Rezaei said Tehran had not decided to withdraw from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, though he said US conduct “may push Tehran into withdrawing.”
Rezaei rejected US accusations that Tehran violated the expired agreement by striking an oil tanker in the Strait of Hormuz, saying Iran acted only after US strikes on Bandar Abbas. He said mediated talks with Qatar and Pakistan remain under way.
Rezaei denied Iranian involvement in Yemen’s war, saying the Bab al-Mandeb Strait “is a Yemeni matter” tied to the Houthi movement, not Iran.