Trump and Pezeshkian: a meeting is possible, but not agreed
The door to direct talks between Washington and Tehran appears open. But large hurdles lie between a public signal and robust negotiations.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio's wording was deliberately open: President Donald Trump was ready to meet Iran's President Masoud Pezeshkian, he said on the margins of the UN General Assembly. So far, however, no arrangement has grown out of that readiness. Neither a date nor a venue within New York nor a joint agenda has been officially confirmed.
That distinction matters precisely in a tense situation. A publicly opened door can prepare the ground for talks. It can equally serve to shift responsibility onto the other side if no meeting materialises.
Washington sends a signal with a caveat
Rubio's statement shows that the US administration does not fundamentally rule out direct contact at the highest level. That is diplomatically relevant, because personal encounters between American and Iranian presidents are rare and can trigger considerable domestic political resistance on both sides.
Trump also stated that American representatives had held a conversation lasting several hours with an Iranian delegation, which in his view went well. This account comes from the US president; its scope, the participants involved and concrete results were not independently confirmed in the same detail. It should therefore be treated as a statement by Washington, not as proof of an understanding already reached.
Mediators want to open the channel
Reports by Associated Press and Axios point to efforts by Gulf states to enable direct talks. Much is at stake for Qatar and other regional players: further escalation threatens energy infrastructure, shipping lanes and security across the entire Gulf region. Mediation is therefore not merely diplomatic prestige for them, but immediate self-interest.
A meeting of presidents could bundle expectations, but it would be no guarantee of progress. Before any encounter, negotiators would at least have to clarify what is being talked about: a ceasefire, nuclear questions, sanctions, regional attacks or an exchange of prisoners. Without such preparation, a summit can end in maximalist demands presented in public.
The hardest question is the sequence
Washington demands verifiable steps from Iran and relies on political and economic pressure. Tehran, for its part, demands security guarantees and a relaxation of sanctions. Both sides can portray any concession as weakness. This produces the classic problem of diplomatic sequencing: who takes the first step, and how is it prevented that the other side exploits it without delivering anything itself?
A durable process would therefore require small, verifiable stages. Conceivable options include communication channels to avoid military incidents, humanitarian agreements or time-limited measures that can be withdrawn if they are not honoured. Whether such proposals are in fact part of the current contacts is not publicly documented.
Where Switzerland is concerned
De-escalation is relevant for Switzerland for several reasons. The conflict influences energy prices, insurance and transport costs as well as the safety of Swiss nationals and companies in the region. Bern also has many years of diplomatic experience as a protecting power and with confidential channels of talks. That does not, however, automatically mean that Switzerland plays an operational role in the current contacts; such a role would have to be confirmed.
The news is therefore smaller and at the same time more significant than it initially sounds. Smaller, because no meeting has been agreed. More significant, because Washington publicly does not rule out direct contact and regional mediators are evidently working on it. Whether this becomes diplomacy will not be decided by a photograph of two presidents, but by an agenda, verifiable interim steps and the willingness of both sides to carry domestic political risks.
