As President Donald Trump was departing Washington last week for Florida, ending the war with Iran appeared the last thing on his mind.
“You don’t do a ceasefire when you’re literally obliterating the other side,” he said Friday from the White House South Lawn before getting in his helicopter and flying away.
Three days, one ultimatum and — in his telling — a few conversations with a mystery official in Tehran later, Trump had adopted a different view.
“They want to settle, and we’re going to get it done,” he declared before a crowd in Memphis, Tennessee, on Monday, before touring Elvis’ Graceland.
The sudden turnabout and, according to Trump, rapidly advancing peace talks made for an abrupt shift in the administration’s approach to the war after the president threatened Saturday evening to hit Iran’s power plants if the Strait of Hormuz wasn’t opened in 48 hours.
And now there is an even a proposal for Pakistan to host a meeting between the US and Iran later this week, which Vice President JD Vance could attend, two sources said. CNN has reached out to Vance’s office.
The change in US posture came after warnings from Gulf allies that the striking civilian power sites in Iran could lead to disastrous escalation, according to people familiar with the conversations. And the announcement of talks, made two hours before the open of US trading on Monday, resulted in a rally on Wall Street and a sharp slide in the price of Brent crude — both areas that had been causing heartburn for Trump and his advisers.
Who, exactly, is doing the talking — or even whether they were talking at all — instantly became a matter of dispute. Trump, who refused to name the Iranian interlocutor his envoys were engaging, provided few details beyond describing the official as “respected.” And even as the president was speaking, additional Marine units were heading toward the Middle East, fueling skepticism about how real the talks are.
For its part, Tehran denied any talks and claimed Trump had backed down from his threat because he was afraid of Iranian retaliation.
“No negotiations have been held with the US,” Iran’s parliament speaker, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, who was rumored to be the official Trump was referring to, wrote on X. He said the US’ postponement of power plant strikes was meant to “escape the quagmire in which the US and Israel are trapped.”
Still, the denials were carefully worded and did not refute that messages had been passed back and forth testing the waters for a potential resumption of talks.
Multiple countries are now actively working to mediate a deal between the US and Iran as the impacts of the war reverberate across the world, five sources familiar with the matter told CNN. The sources were not aware of any direct negotiations between the US and Iran since the outbreak of the war, despite Trump’s claims.
The White House refused to elaborate on the discussions, which Trump said were led by his envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner.
“These are sensitive diplomatic discussions and the U.S. will not negotiate through the press. This is a fluid situation, and speculation about meetings should not be deemed as final until they are formally announced by the White House,” press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement.
Pakistan, Turkey, Egypt and Oman are involved in negotiation efforts, the sources familiar said. The diplomatic efforts are aimed at both reaching a ceasefire and securing safe passage for ships through the Strait of Hormuz, they said.
Two regional sources said the US had shared a 15-point list of expectations for the Iranians via Pakistan, but it was unclear whether Iran had agreed to any of the terms. One source said several of the points would be “next to impossible” for Iran to accept, and the other source said it mirrored the points the US tabled with Iran in discussions last year. Trump on Monday also referenced a 15-point proposal when he claimed the US and Iran had reached “major points of agreement.”
The Pakistanis are working on a proposal and mediation efforts, and the Omanis have also sent messages back and forth between the US and Iran regarding the Strait of Hormuz, sources said. The Egyptians are also engaged in what sources described as active diplomatic efforts, sources said.
Pakistan has developed a strong relationship with the Trump administration over the last year, and has long maintained discussions with the Iranian regime. The country shares a long border with Iran and gets about 90% of its oil through the Strait of Hormuz, so the conflict has directly impacted the country, one source pointed out.
On the Pakistani side, the Intelligence Chief Lt. Gen. Asim Malik is one of the officials now engaging with Witkoff and Kushner, one source said.
“If both sides agree, Pakistan is always ready to host talks,” Foreign Office spokesperson Tahir Hussain Andrabi told CNN on Monday.
And there has been a flurry of calls between Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan and counterparts, including Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi and Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty, one source said. Fidan also spoke with Witkoff on Sunday.
One of the regional sources theorized the administration is reaching out to Iran through multiple countries to ensure its messages are being received by all relevant figures in Tehran. There is an understanding, this source said, that a sustained end to the war will likely be a longer process.
“Diplomacy is being conducted as we speak, there are multiple proposals in play. The nature of diplomacy is that it’s a free-flowing discussion,” said a source familiar with the discussions. “None of the proposals discussed have reached a stage of maturing or general acceptance.”
Other governments said they were aware of ongoing talks. “We, the UK, were aware that that was happening,” British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who spoke by telephone with Trump on Sunday evening, said a day later.
Senior members of the Trump administration, including the president and Vance, also worked Monday to ensure Israel was aware of the developments, sources said. Both Trump and Vance spoke to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, whose war objectives have appeared to diverge from the United States’ in recent days.
On Monday, as he touted the supposed talks, Trump detailed several of the specifics among the 15-point proposal — many of which sounded similar to US demands before the war.
“They’re not going to have a nuclear weapon. That’s number one. That’s number one, two and three,” he said of the list. “They will never have a nuclear weapon.”
He also said the US would insist on taking possession of Iran’s highly enriched uranium, believed to be buried deep underneath the Isfahan nuclear site, which the US destroyed during a bombing run in June. “We want the nuclear dust. We’re going to want that, and I think we’re going to get that,” Trump said.
Among the other points on the table: limits on Tehran’s defense capabilities, a cessation of support for proxies and an acknowledgment of Israel’s right to exist, the two regional sources said.
Trump’s comments Monday were a departure for the president, who for weeks had shrugged off even the idea of restarting discussions with Tehran, suggesting the regime was neither serious about making the requisite concessions nor its leadership intact enough to act as a reliable negotiating partner.
“All of their leaders are dead, as far as we know. But they’re all dead. We don’t know who we’re dealing with,” he said last week.
On Friday evening, as he said he was uninterested in brokering a truce, Trump still said he would be open to talking. “We could have dialogue, but I don’t want to do a ceasefire,” he said on the South Lawn.
An hour later, as he was jetting toward Palm Beach aboard Air Force One, Trump wrote on social media he was considering “winding down” the war as it entered its fourth week.
But by the next evening, in between dancing for guests in his ballroom and conferring with national security advisers, it had become clearer than ever that his efforts to reopen the Strait of Hormuz — a key waterway for 20% of the world’s oil — had fallen short. He set a 48-hour clock before vowing to “obliterate” Iran’s power plants.
By Trump’s own narrative, the talks with Iran commenced around the same time Saturday evening he issued his threat. Administration officials appearing on Sunday morning talk shows gave little indication that secret talks were underway that might convince the president to back off.
“Sometimes you have to escalate to de-escalate,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said on NBC.
Yet the threat against Iran’s civilian infrastructure alarmed officials in the Gulf, who rushed to warn the US administration that doing so would amount to many steps up the escalation ladder, according to people familiar with the conversations.
Iran appeared to confirm those fears, warning it would retaliate by targeting energy sites and other infrastructure among the US’ Middle Eastern allies, including desalination plants, which many countries in the region rely on for nearly all their fresh water.
And some US partners conveyed a view that destroying power infrastructure in Iran could devastate the country, and preclude efforts to rebuild once the war ends.
But amid new talk of talking, it’s unclear who would give final sign-off for Iran on a deal.
The health status of new Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei is unknown. His inexperience in high-level diplomacy also begs questions about his involvement. And Araghchi, the foreign minister, is engaged with the Omanis, but it’s not clear that he is also the point person on the Iranian side for messages other countries are sending between the two sides, sources said.
“We have not heard from the son,” Trump said Monday.
However, he appeared optimistic his efforts could result in a quick resolution to the war.
“You have to understand, my whole life has been a negotiation,” the president told his audience in Memphis. “But with Iran, we’ve been negotiating for a long time. And this time, they mean business.”
