Iran receives US reply to proposal for ending seven-month war

Iran says it has received an official American response to its latest plan for ending the seven-month war, even though President Donald Trump rejected the proposal publicly only days ago.

Tehran has not said whether Washington accepted or refused the offer. Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi delivered the response to President Masoud Pezeshkian during a Cabinet meeting, according to the state-run IRNA news agency, as reported by the Boston Globe.

Pezeshkian said Iran would continue working towards an agreement, but insisted that any settlement should benefit both sides and protect what he described as the rights of the Iranian people.

The development followed Araghchi’s return from New York, where he attended the United Nations General Assembly. Iranian officials held indirect discussions with American representatives during the gathering and met separately with mediators from Qatar and Pakistan.

The Strait of Hormuz at the centre of talks

Araghchi briefed ministers on those meetings and on Tehran’s conditions for reopening the Strait of Hormuz, a crucial route for regional energy shipments. Iranian demands were passed to the United States through mediators, government spokesperson Fatemeh Mohajerani said.

Araghchi had previously proposed restoring access to the strait within a week if Washington lifted its blockade of Iranian ports, released Iranian funds frozen abroad and suspended sanctions affecting the country’s oil exports. Other conditions were also included, although officials have not disclosed the complete proposal.

Trump rejected the offer almost immediately, arguing that Iran was seeking an agreement because it was suffering badly and saying the terms were unacceptable. Nevertheless, unnamed officials told the Boston Globe that intermediaries continued trying to bring the two governments towards a deal that could halt the fighting and reopen the waterway.

The competing pressure was underscored by a new American sanctions package announced on Tuesday. The US Treasury Department targeted 10 people and organisations in Iran, Hong Kong and Pakistan, accusing them of helping procure weapons and components for Iran’s defence ministry.

The measures form part of the Trump administration’s Operation Economic Outcast, an effort to cut the financial channels supporting Iran’s military supply network. They came as Tehran sought relief from the blockade and sanctions through the diplomatic process.

Economic damage deepens

Iran entered the conflict with a weakened economy, but the war has accelerated the decline. The rial reached a new low on Tuesday, with traders in Tehran reportedly exchanging more than 2.5 million rials for one US dollar. The currency had previously fallen to 2.2 million rials per dollar on September 2, only 27 days earlier.

Repeated currency collapses have raised the cost of daily life. Medication prices have surged, with some treatments becoming difficult to obtain and others costing more than three times as much as before. Families are also confronting sharp increases in food and other necessities, while unemployment has grown.

The rial has lost half its value, according to the Boston Globe’s report, adding to the strain caused by the fighting and international restrictions. Iran has tried to raise global energy prices by attacking regional oil shipping routes. The United States has responded by maintaining a port blockade that began in June and by imposing increasingly severe sanctions.

Trump said on Tuesday that Iran was failing and again predicted that the conflict would end soon. His forecasts have shifted during the war: at its beginning, he expected the fighting to last weeks, while more recently he has said it may continue beyond the November 3 US midterm elections.

Executions follow earlier unrest

The diplomatic developments came on the same day that Iran executed two men convicted over violence during nationwide anti-government protests. IRNA said the men were involved in unrest in Mashhad that resulted in the deaths of four security-force members. Iran’s Supreme Court had upheld their death sentences before the executions were carried out on Wednesday morning.

The protests began on December 28, driven initially by anger over the collapsing currency and worsening economic conditions. Demonstrations spread across the country and increasingly included demands for the Islamic Republic’s removal. Iranian authorities responded with a violent crackdown.

Rights organisations say thousands of people were killed and tens of thousands detained during the unrest, while Iranian authorities have published a considerably lower estimate of the death toll. The executions, the economic crisis and the continuing war all add pressure to Iran’s leaders as they consider Washington’s undisclosed response and the prospects for a negotiated settlement.