President Donald Trump said the United States had "very good talks" with Iran after delegations from both countries participated in indirect discussions in Oman Friday.
"Iran looks like it wants to make a deal very badly. We have to see what that deal is," the president said aboard Air Force One.
Friday's meetings in the Gulf Arab state were the first round of negotiations between the two sides since the US and Israel struck the Islamic Republiclast summer.
Both parties have since agreed to hold follow-on discussions after consultations with their capitals, according to a source familiar with the negotiations. Speaking aboard Air Force One, Trump said that another round of negotiations will be held again "early next week," but Araghchi said no date had yet been set for the future talks.
The talks took place amid an American military buildup in the Middle East, and after Trump threatened to strike Iran if itused lethal force against protestersor refuses to sign a nuclear deal.
Ahead of the talks, Iran's foreign minister said his country "enters diplomacy with open eyes and a steady memory of the past year," and after negotiations concluded, Araghchi described it as a "good start."
Still, sharp language has persisted on both sides, with Trump saying on Thursday that Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei "should be very worried," and a day after the high-stakes negotiation, Iran's foreign minister reiterated that Iran would attack regional US bases should Washington carry out its threat of striking the Islamic Republic.
And despite what he said were productive discussions, Trump said Friday a "big fleet" was heading towards Iran and would be arriving soon.
Here's what we know about the talks.
Who is involved?
Araghchi and US envoy Steve Witkoff took part in the talks, along with Jared Kushner, Trump's son-in-law. The talks were indirect – mediated by Omani Foreign Minister Badr Albusaidi, who earlier on Friday met with each of the parties separately.
Despite negotiations being indirect, Araghchi said he had direct contact with the US delegation and that the parties exchanged a handshake, Al Jazeera reported. It's unclear for how long both parties met directly.
In photos released by the state-run Oman News Agency, the commander of US Central Command (CENTCOM), Admiral Brad Cooper, was also seen attending the meetings.
Negotiations are meant to adopt a format similar to previous rounds, Iranian media said. Before the 12-day Iran-Israel war in June, Tehran and Washingtonhad gone through five rounds of negotiations, where Omani mediators shuttled between US and Iranian delegations.
Those talks effectively came to an end after Israel struck Iranian nuclear and military sites in mid-June, after which the US struck three Iranian nuclear facilities.
What was discussed?
Araghchi presented to his Omani counterpart a "preliminary plan" to "manage the current situation" between Iran and the US, Iranian media reported, in a bid to advance negotiations. On Saturday, Iran's top diplomat told Al Jazeera that talks with the US revolved solely around Iran's nuclear program with no discussions held over Tehran's ballistic missiles or regional proxies.
Albusaidi then conveyed the plan to the US delegation led by Witkoff, and the American response will be delivered to the Iranian side during the talks, Iranian media added.
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The scope of the talks was unclear. Before the meetings, Iranian officials insisted they only wanted to discuss issues related to the nuclear program, and that other matters such as Iran's ballistic missile program, proxies across the region and domestic unrest were off-limits.
The US had demanded a broader set of discussions that includes ballistic missiles, Tehran's armed proxies that remain a danger to US and Israeli interests in the region, and Iran's recent brutal crackdown on protests.
On the nuclear issue, a key point of contention remains Iran's demand to enrich uranium – a nuclear fuel that can be used to make a bomb if purified to high levels – which the US and its allies reject. Iran has offered to place checks on its nuclear program to ensure that it isn't weaponized, demanding the lifting of sanctions in return.
A day after the negotiation on Saturday, Araghchi told Al Jazeera that his country will not accept completely halting its nuclear enrichment.
After the talks ended on Friday, in a sign that the US wants to keep up economic pressure, it rolled out new sanctions on Iranian oil and 14 vessels carrying it.
"Instead of investing in the welfare of its own people and crumbling infrastructure, the Iranian regime continues to fund destabilizing activities around the world and step up its repression inside Iran," said State Department Deputy Spokesperson Tommy Pigott.
What's at stake?
The US moved military assets, including the USS Abraham Lincoln carrier strike group, closer to the Middle East, raising concerns that prospects of war were growing.
Trump said last month that the US had"an armada"moving toward Iran "just in case," adding that while he would rather not "see anything happen," his administration is watching Iran "very closely."
The talks gave rise to hopes that a full-blown war may be averted. However, Trump on Friday said a "big fleet" will be arriving in the region soon.
Regional countries have been attempting to de-escalate and deter Trump from launching an attack on Iran, knowing that a new war will only plunge the region into crisis.
Tehran has made it clear that any US attack will not be met with the same "restraint" it showed last summer after Israel and the US struck the country.
Iran has a number of tools at its disposal should war break out with the US or Israel. It is believed to have thousands of missiles and drones that could target US troops and assets in the Middle East.
When US bombers struck Iranian nuclear facilities in the summer, Iran launched an unprecedented missile strike in Qatar, targeting al-Udeid Air Base, the largest US military installation in the Middle East.
Iran could also mobilize a vast network of proxies across the region, potentially hitting Israel and US bases, and disrupting shipping in the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow waterway through which more than a fifth of the world's oil and a large share of its liquefied natural gas flow. This could send shock waves around the world.
CNN's Fred Pleitgen, Samantha Waldenberg, Lex Harvey, Jessie Yeung, Jennifer Hansler, Mohammed Tawfeeq and Todd Symons contributed to this report.
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