Iranian leaders fear being burned again by President Trump, who tore up a nuclear agreement reached during the Obama administration after lengthy negotiations.
President Trump and Iran’s leaders have wide differences on many issues, from nuclear technology to the Strait of Hormuz. But their main obstacle to striking a lasting peace agreement may be a matter of trust.
Always wary of the United States, Iranian officials consider Mr. Trump particularly treacherous. They remember the way, during his first term as president, Mr. Trump simply abandoned a nuclear deal Iran had struck with the Obama administration and other world powers after nearly two years of negotiations. Mr. Trump did not claim that Iran was violating that deal; he simply didn’t like it.
When the Biden administration tried to coax Iran into a similar agreement a few years later, Iran’s leadership demanded a guarantee that a future Trump administration would not simply tear it up again, according to former U.S. officials. They had no way of providing one.
And twice over the past year, Mr. Trump has entered into diplomatic talks with Iran only to launch airstrikes while negotiations were still in their early stages. In late February, Mr. Trump sent envoys to meet with Iranian officials in Geneva just one day before Iran’s supreme leader was killed in an airstrike that began weeks of U.S. and Israeli bombing. By the time of that meeting, Mr. Trump had already committed to war, according to U.S. officials.
After a first round of talks earlier this month ended in rancor, Iranian officials said a main reason was a U.S. failure to gain their trust. On Tuesday, Vice President JD Vance delayed his departure to Pakistan for a potential second round of talks, as Iranian officials again raised the point.
On Monday, Iranian state media reported that the country’s president, Masoud Pezeshkian, had warned in a Sunday phone call with Pakistan’s prime minister that “the U.S. seeks to repeat previous patterns and betray diplomacy,” according to the Islamic Republic News Agency.