By Steve Holland and Kanishka Singh
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. Special Envoy Steve Witkoff plans to meet Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi in Oman on Sunday and discuss Iran’s response to a recent American proposal for a nuclear deal, a U.S. official said late on Wednesday.
Iran said on Monday it will soon hand a counter-proposal for a nuclear deal to the United States in response to a U.S. offer that Tehran deems “unacceptable,” while U.S. President Donald Trump said talks would continue.
Trump told a podcast on Monday he was less confident that Iran will agree to stop uranium enrichment in a nuclear deal with Washington.
Trump has been seeking a new nuclear deal to place limits on Iran’s disputed uranium enrichment activities and has threatened the Islamic Republic with bombing if no agreement is reached.
Iran has long said it has no plans to develop nuclear weapons and is only interested in atomic power generation and other peaceful projects.
During his first White House term, Trump withdrew the U.S. from a 2015 deal between Iran and world powers that placed limits on Tehran’s uranium enrichment drive in exchange for relief from international sanctions.
Uneasy relations between Iran and the U.S. go back decades. Tehran says Washington has interfered in its affairs, citing events ranging from a 1953 coup against a prime minister to the 2020 killing of its military commander in a U.S. drone strike.
Washington cites Iran’s backing of militant groups in the Middle East including Hamas in Gaza, Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Houthis in Yemen to say that Iran poses a threat to U.S. ally Israel and Washington’s interests in the region.
The militant groups describe themselves as the “Axis of Resistance” to Israeli and U.S. influence in the Middle East.
Trump said on Wednesday U.S. personnel were being moved out of the Middle East because “it could be a dangerous place.”
The decision by the U.S. to evacuate some personnel comes at a volatile moment in the region. Trump’s efforts to reach a nuclear deal with Iran appear to be deadlocked and U.S. intelligence indicates that Israel has been making preparations for a strike against Iran’s nuclear facilities.
(Reporting by Kanishka Singh in Washington; Editing by Himani Sarkar and Lincoln Feast)
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