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Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baqaei. Credit: Islamic Republic News Agency

The US-Iran talks are now supposedly set for Oman on Friday. “Nuclear talks between the US and Iran are expected to take place on Friday in the Sultanate of Oman, according to an Arab source familiar with the details,” Israeli journalist Barak Ravid wrote on X last night. “The Arab source stated that the Trump administration agreed to the Iranian request to move the talks from Turkey. However, discussions are still ongoing regarding whether Arab and Muslim countries from the region will join the talks in Oman.”

As of last night, IRNA had only confirmed that discussions on the venue were still ongoing. Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baqaei said late yesterday that planning for the negotiations has been made for the coming days, and consultations to determine the venue for the talks are currently underway while information will be shared as soon as it is finalized, reported IRNA. He clarified that in principle, the location and timing of the talks are not complex issues and should not serve as a pretext for media games. Baqaei pointed out that Turkey, Oman, and several other regional countries have expressed their readiness to host the talks, which is highly valued by Iran.

But Iran is also reportedly trying to narrow the agenda down to Iran’s nuclear progarm as well but the US has not agreed to that. “We thought we had an established forum that had been agreed to in Turkey that was put together by a number of partners who wanted to attend and be a part of it. I saw conflicting reports yesterday from the Iranian side saying that they had not agreed to that, so that’s still being worked through,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio told reporters during an event in Washington today.

“At the end of the day, the United States is prepared to engage, and has always been prepared to engage with Iran,” he claimed further. “For talks to actually lead to something meaningful, they will have to include certain things, and that includes the range of their ballistic missiles,” he says. “That includes their sponsorship of terrorist organizations across the region. That includes the nuclear program. And that includes the treatment of their own people.”

All of this has the ring that Iran capitulates to U.S.-Israeli demands. According to The Wall Street Journal, Middle Eastern officials involved in efforts to deescalate the tensions say they are downgrading expectations for Friday’s meeting following their conversations with Iranian diplomats. They say they now expect it to be an exchange of ideas with few concrete outcomes, and some say they are resigned to what they see as an inevitable military confrontation.