On February 6, the United States and Iran met indirectly in Muscat for talks that both sides described as a constructive opening but left unresolved. Iran’s foreign minister, Araghchi, called the session a "good start" and said both delegations agreed to continue discussions, while Washington quietly announced sanctions on entities tied to Iranian oil trade on the same day.
The U.S. delegation was reported to include presidential special envoy Witkoff and Jared Kushner, alongside a senior U.S. Central Command officer, underscoring the blend of diplomacy and military leverage in U.S. strategy. Tehran has made clear it will not accept a wholesale ban on uranium enrichment, rejecting a key U.S. demand that President Trump has framed as pursuit of "zero" Iranian nuclear capability.
Regional capitals and the United Nations publicly welcomed the resumption of dialogue. Oman, which hosted the talks, described them as serious; Qatar and Jordan urged a negotiated settlement that secures regional stability; and U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres said renewed engagement could help reduce tensions and avert wider conflict.
At the same time, the Muscat talks took place amid heightened military posturing. Iran displayed the Khoramshahr-4 ballistic missile and placed its armed forces on high alert, while Israel warned it was prepared to launch a far more forceful strike than last year if diplomacy failed. U.S. statements mixed diplomacy with thinly veiled threats, and the sanctions the State Department announced during the talks sent a conflicting signal to Tehran.
China-based analysts framed the Muscat meeting as both necessary and precarious. Qin Tian, deputy director of the Middle East Institute at the China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations, summarized the situation as characterised by three realities: high difficulty because of deep mutual hostility and recent kinetic exchanges; a tight, temporary negotiation window; and a mix of hope and risk — genuine flexibility on parts of the Iranian side but credible U.S. options to use force if talks collapse.
The result is a fragile diplomatic opening that is at once promising and limited. Success would require sustained, patient negotiation and mutual concessions on enrichment and sanctions; failure risks a rapid slide back into escalation, with military plans already in place and regional actors primed to react. For international actors and energy markets, even a short delay in confrontation matters; for the countries involved, however, the deeper test will be whether both sides can convert a single constructive session into a durable framework for limiting Iran’s nuclear programme while addressing U.S. security concerns.