After days of secrecy, senior U.S. officials on Wednesday dictated the memorandum of understanding with Iran to journalists. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity to read the draft, which Iran has not released, ahead of a formal signing ceremony set for Friday.
The U.S. draft of the agreement includes a new ‘minimum’ standard for the dilution of Iran’s highly enriched uranium and toll-free passage of the Strait of Hormuz for 60 days, though
it doesn’t preclude future fees, the officials said. It also features provisions to ensure “territorial integrity” of Lebanon after Israel’s latest attacks there against Hezbollah, according to the officials. In return, the U.S. will move to waive, but not eliminate, some wide-ranging sanctions against Iran once the deal is signed.
U.S. President Donald Trump, meanwhile, is wrapping up his time with world leaders in Évian-les-Bains, France, for the Group of Seven summit. Trump has blurred the timeline for the Iran deal’s signing — amid conflicting messages about whether the deal has already been signed — even as he tries to sell the tentative agreement as a pact that will ensure Iran never develops a nuclear weapon.
Trump’s last stop in France is a glitzy dinner at the Palace of Versailles outside of Paris.
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The second official said the signed memorandum of understanding is final and has not been changed since it was signed electronically on Sunday. But the official said either side could walk away at any time until they reach a final deal, which they will attempt to do over 60 days.
The official referred to the plans to work with Iran to reach a final deal as a “gentleman’s agreement” and said they would find out in talks starting this weekend whether they can continue moving forward.
If talks with Iran do not seem to be working, then the U.S. could pull the plug on the effort to negotiate and return to “tightening the screws on them very, very aggressively,” the official said.
A statement from the campaign group calls it the “summit of omissions” that was “defined as much by what was left off the agenda as by what was discussed.”
“Climate change, gender inequality and human rights were conspicuously sidelined to secure President Trump’s attendance. Silence became a strategy,” it said.
But the statement welcomed the G7 leaders’ call for a strong and coordinated response to the Ebola outbreak in Congo.
He has repeatedly denied that the U.S. is sending money to Iran as part of a deal, but he said Iranian assets frozen during the war should be returned.
“It’s not our money, it’s their money, and we froze it,” Trump said. “At a certain point in time, I guess we’re going to have to give it back.”
Trump said he considered keeping the frozen assets for the U.S., but said it would hurt the strength of the U.S. dollar. “If we didn’t give it back, nobody would ever invest in the dollar again,” he said.
Asked about the possibility of blaming the vice president if the deal with Iran doesn’t work out, Trump replied, “I like that idea, sure.”
“This way, if it works out, I’m going to take the credit. If it doesn’t work out, I’m blaming JD,” the president continued. Then, striking a more playful tone, he added, “You better be careful, JD.”
Vance has become a leading administration voice promoting the initial agreement to end the war in Iran, even as Trump has occasionally contradicted facets of the agreement that Vance has announced publicly.
The vice president is expected to be part of the U.S. delegation signing the agreement Friday in Switzerland. But Trump joked of Vance, “He’s gonna turn his plane around and get the hell out of here.”
Iran’s Foreign Ministry on Wednesday night suggested that Presidents Donald Trump and Masoud Pezeshkian could sign the deal with the United States.
Such a signing ceremony would represent a major step for the two countries, which saw diplomatic relations break off in 1980 over the U.S. Embassy hostage crisis in Tehran.
Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmail Baghaei, quoted by Iranian state television, made the comment.
Pezeshkian became president on a promise of seeking better relations with the West. However, he’s been sidelined for months after Iran’s mass killing of protesters in January and in the war as hard-liners broadly have taken over the levers of the country’s theocracy.
Senior U.S. officials have dictated the memorandum of understanding with Iran to journalists after days of secrecy.
The officials spoke on condition of anonymity to read the draft, which Iran has not released, ahead of a formal signing ceremony set for Friday.
According to the officials, the draft agreement includes a new ‘minimum’ standard for downblending of highly enriched Iranian uranium. Also, it has provisions to ensure the ‘territorial integrity’ of Lebanon after Israel’s latest attacks against Hezbollah in Lebanese territory.
In return, the U.S. will move to waive, but not eliminate, some wide-ranging sanctions against Iran once the deal is signed.
The U.S. draft of the agreement also only secures toll-free passage of the Strait of Hormuz for 60 days, and it doesn’t preclude fees in the future, the officials said.
Asked how the terms of an agreement would be enforced, Trump said the threat of further bombings would be enough.
“What else am I going to do? Am I going to say, ‘I’m going to take you to court?’” Trump said. “You know, we’re going to bomb the hell out of them if they violate the agreement.”
Trump said he doesn’t think Iran will veer from the deal and said he does not want to resume attacks. But he added that “bad things happen in war — war is a nasty place.”
Asked whether he’d hold anyone in his administration accountable for the deadly missile strike on an elementary school in Iran that killed over 165 people, the president suggested that no, he would not.
Trump said it was an odd question given that the bombing had happened so long ago, during the opening days of the war in Iran.
He also said that all war is nasty and that, in this case, mistakes might have been made, but that “Nobody did it on purpose.”
Trump also said, though, that the Department of Defense is still investigating the bombing.
During a subsequent question, he returned to the school bombing, repeating the sentiment that war was nasty: “Bad things happen in war.”
It wasn’t immediately clear who would be visiting from Lebanon — Trump first said the president and then the prime minister would be coming to Washington “over the next week or two.”
Trump repeatedly expressed sympathy for Lebanon while criticizing Israel, calling it a source of tension with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
“I say, ‘You can do a little softer touch, Bibi. You don’t have to knock down a building every time somebody walks into it that’s from Hezbollah,’” Trump said.
Trump said he feels bad for Lebanon, adding that it was “a great culture.”
“It was an incredible culture, maybe the highest in the Middle East, for years and years, centuries,” Trump said. “And for the last 50, 60 years, they have been just trashed.”
The president began the press conference by speaking for around 40 straight minutes – offering a steady, stream-of-consciousness-style monologue that covered everything from Iran and Ukraine to drug dealers hiding fentanyl in hubcaps.
Trump talked about not wanting to crash the U.S. economy during the Iran war and said he thought Russia and Ukraine might make a deal to end that war.
He boasted about securing the U.S.-Mexico border but said that Mexico “has lost control of that country” and suggested that smuggling cartels – which he said hid drugs in cars and car parts to move them over the U.S.-Mexico border – had Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum “scared.”
Trump also talked about reaching a possible nuclear accord internationally, even as he suggested that he’d avoided “a nuclear holocaust.” And he said he was looking forward to admiring the golden finishes of the Palace of Versailles when he went to dinner there later Wednesday.
As he wrapped up his meandering opener during his press conference, the president noted that the leaders of China and Russia - often allies with Iran - largely stayed out of the conflict.
“They could’ve made it much more difficult for us,” Trump said.
China, in particular, had weapons that could “knock down airplanes,” he said.
“I said. ‘I would really appreciate your not giving or selling any of that stuff to Iran,’” Trump continued. “And you know what? For the most part, he didn’t.”
“JD made a statement. It was a perfect statement, and they reported it in a very strange way. But that’s because that’s why it’s fake news, I guess,” Trump said.
He emphasized that the U.S. is “not investing any money” even though he said Tehran will need aid to recover.
Amid conflicting messages from Trump and top administration officials about whether an initial deal to end the war in Iran had already been signed, Trump said the agreement could be signed “maybe tomorrow” or the next day, meaning Thursday or Friday.
Trump recalled his years as a developer and said, “My whole life is all about deals,” and that sometimes “Crazy things happen with deals.”
But he added, “We are going to most likely sign a deal.” He said Iran wants “to sign a deal, and they’ve been acting very appropriately.”
Exactly what the deal entails is a matter of confusion since Trump and his administration have refuted publicly reported details without providing concrete details, they say are correct.
Trump also said a copy of the deal would be released and that the U.S. sent a copy to Israel.
After complaining for months that U.S. allies were doing too little to help the U.S. in Iran and the Strait of Hormuz, Trump on Wednesday quickly shifted to praise for their support of a deal.
“The past two days have provided a chance to discuss the details of this historic agreement with many of our closest friends and allies, including the G7 nations and many presidents and prime ministers,” Trump said in remarks at the summit.
It comes after U.S. allies issued a statement welcoming the framework of a deal to extend the U.S.-Iran ceasefire and reopen the Strait of Hormuz.
Trump said, “They all put out statements saying they love this deal, because they want to see it over.”
The president suggested that fears of a weakening U.S. economy were a big driver for the administration’s work to negotiate an initial deal to end the Iran war.
“Every time we talked about the possibility of peace, the stock market shot up like a rocket ship,” Trump said. “The stock market is more brilliant than anybody there is.”
Trump also said that the “one thing I didn’t want to see is, I didn’t want to see economic catastrophe.” He said that “could have happened” if the war had continued.
“The one president I did not want to be was the late, great Herbert Hoover,” Trump said, referring to the president whose policies helped exacerbate the Great Depression.
French President Emmanuel Macron defended his decision to roll out the red carpet for Trump, including a dinner at the Palace of Versailles later Wednesday.
“Versailles is a diplomatic tool and an instrument of influence,” Macron said.
Using a soccer analogy, Macron said he approaches diplomacy like the French national team: “Whether I’m playing at home or away, my goal is to score goals. And when I host other teams, I try to give them a nice welcome.”
Macron said he has “always trusted President Trump” because they both have “always spoken frankly.”
That applies on U.S. tariffs issues, Macron said, after Trump threatened 100% tariff on French wines unless a European digital tax is dropped. Macron is still seeking a compromise that would avoid U.S. tariffs from taking effect.
“Partners should never impose tariffs on one another or create instability,” Macron said.
The French leader is taking aim at a Trump administration directive preventing the use of Anthropic’s latest artificial intelligence models by foreign nationals.
He said it is “a good thing” that U.S. officials recognize that cutting-edge AI models could be dangerous. “What do they fear? That these models could be used by others to attack them or attack us,” he said.
But the “very strong decision” from the Trump administration is also “a bad thing,” he said. “The reaction is in some regards strictly nationalist.”
Anthropic said it has taken its latest artificial intelligence models, known as Fable 5 and Mythos 5, offline to comply with the directive. The AI giant said it did not believe the steps taken by the government were warranted by the concern it flagged about a potential security issue.
Macron said the summit, attended by Zelenskyy, helped convince Trump that Russia currently has no serious intention of negotiating peace.
It’s too early to say whether there would be a clear “before” and “after” the Evian summit, Macron said — future developments will determine its impact.
“But there was an Evian moment, certainly on Ukraine,” he said.
G7 leaders discussed the revolutionary technology on Wednesday, the summit’s last day.
The French leader, the summit host, called for regulation.
“No one — neither political leaders nor business leaders — can any longer ignore the impact of AI on our democracies, on our societies. That is why the possibility and the necessity of regulation have now become imperative,” he said.
Italy’s Premier Giorgia Meloni said the existence of a deal gave leaders an opportunity to show unity among Western allies on major global crises.
“The U.S.-Iran agreement … clearly had a positive influence” on the summit’s climate, and all the leaders congratulated Trump, she said.
Talking to reporters at the end of the meetings, she said discussions were dominated by the war in Ukraine and developments in the Middle East and Gulf, adding that G7 leaders agreed on the need to sustain support for Kyiv and “maintain high pressure on Moscow.”
Meloni said Western unity is “one of the most effective tools” to create conditions for negotiations, with the goal of direct talks between Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Russian President Vladimir Putin.
She said Zelenskyy had shown a “sincere attitude” toward a solution, while “no serious signals have arrived from Moscow.”
Senate Majority Leader John Thune said Wednesday that Republicans still plan to move forward with a confirmation hearing for Jay Clayton, the president’s nominee for director of national intelligence, despite Trump saying in an early morning social media post that he wanted to cancel it.
“Chairman Cotton is planning to proceed, as you all know, with the hearing,” Thune told reporters. “And then from there on, we’ll just have to take it a day at a time until we get more clarity on what the White House position is on this.”
Senate Republicans had hoped Clayton’s nomination would help break the impasse over renewing a key national security surveillance authority that lapsed last week amid Democratic opposition to Trump’s temporary DNI pick, Bill Pulte.
Asked Wednesday why Trump was now holding up the effort, Thune offered a blunt response: “Good question.”
Macron cited what he described as China’s industrial overcapacity, excessive subsidies and weak domestic consumption.
The French president said Europe needs to invest more and modernize its economies, while the United States must address its fiscal and trade deficits.
The French president says it’s a “very good deal” and that U.S. allies in the G7 support it “because it’s an agreement that puts a stop to a situation of great instability that had terrible consequences for our economies.”
It’s due to be signed Friday.
At his news conference, Macron is detailing the statements — nine in all — that the summit produced, on cancer, rare earths, the Ebola outbreak in Congo and other topics.
Macron said the Evian summit produced an “unprecedented convergence” among G7 leaders, including Trump, in supporting Ukraine, after he invited Zelenskyy to take part in the gathering.
Macron said “we all agreed to increase the supply of air defense capabilities, additional systems and interceptors, as well as long-range capabilities.”
Trump “emphasized the mobilization of the American defense industry and its ability to provide such equipment,” Macron told a news conference.
Macron also praised the leaders’ agreement to increase pressure on Russia, including through stronger sanctions, as “extremely important.”
At his news conference closing out the 3-day summit that he hosted, the French president is detailing the progress he says was made.
“It was a moment of unity, of high-quality discussions and of real cooperation between the leaders,” Macron said.
