Mediators set up de-escalation channels ahead of US-Iran talks, source says

Iranians walk past a billboard featuring a picture of Iran’s late supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei ahead of his funeral in Tehran.

DUBAI – US and Iranian officials will hold talks on June 30 in Qatar, President Trump said on June 29, the latest indication that tensions were de-escalating after the two sides traded strikes over the weekend.

Four officials familiar with the negotiations said the talks were not expected to include senior political leaders like Vice-President J.D. Vance, who led the previous round of negotiations in Switzerland a week ago.

Trump is instead sending his top envoy Steve Witkoff and son-in-law Jared Kushner to Doha.

“Special Envoy Witkoff and Jared Kushner will be flying to Doha for high-level meetings this week, as we continue to discuss the memorandum of understanding. On the sidelines of those high-level talks, will be the technical talks,” Trump’s press secretary Karoline Leavitt told Fox News.

“As far as we’re concerned, we’re holding up our end of the ceasefire. Violence will be met with violence,” Leavitt added.

A source with knowledge of the discussions said mediators have established communications channels to de-escalate any incidents, and that technical talks are set to continue.

Unlike previous technical talks between Tehran and Washington in Switzerland, however, the focus would be on managing the Strait of Hormuz and de-escalating tensions.

The US and Iran signed on June 17 a 14-point memorandum of understanding aimed at ending four months of conflict. Both sides agreed to cease hostilities and reopen the Hormuz strait, a vital conduit for global oil and gas shipments that Iran blockaded during the conflict.

Closure of the waterway sent oil prices soaring to above US$100 a barrel, triggering a renewed spike in global inflation and causing a political headache for Trump by pushing up prices at the pump months before midterm elections in the US.

The accord paves the way for 60 days of more in-depth talks on thornier issues such as Iran’s nuclear programme, although both sides have given conflicting accounts as to what was agreed.

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said on June 29 that US$6 billion (S$7.8 billion) out of US$12 billion of assets frozen in Qatar would be released following the accord and returned to Iran, Iranian state media reported.

He described the memorandum, which includes waivers for sanctions on Iran’s oil and petrochemical sectors, as “a great victory for the Iranian people”.

The senior Iranian source said Qatar and Iran were in the final stages of agreeing on technicalities f