US Vice President JD Vance spoke to Fox News’ Bret Baier on Monday, following the weekend talks with Iran in Islamabad.
Vance stated that, despite the fact that no agreement was ultimately reached between the sides, some progress was made.
“I wouldn't just say that things went wrong, I also think things went right. We made a lot of progress, but we also made very clear, and I think this is part of the progress we made, what the terms where the United States could make some accommodation, what terms we were flexible on, and what things we absolutely needed to see in order for the President of the United States to feel like he was getting a good deal," Vance said.
He continued, “And so we laid those things out, we had some good conversations. I think it was the first time that you'd ever seen the Iranian government [and] the US government meet at such a high level, maybe in the history of the current leadership of Iran. So that's, I think, a positive. And again, we did make some progress in the negotiation."
Vance explained that “the big question from here on out is whether the Iranians will have enough flexibility, whether the Iranians will accept the critical things that we need to see in order for things to get done."
He stated that the US red lines for Iran all flow from Trump’s fundamental red line that Iran can never have a nuclear weapon.
“So all of our red lines flow from that fundamental premise, because it is one thing for the Iranians to say that they themselves are never going to have a nuclear weapon. They are willing to say that, and that's good. But you have to, of course, verify these things," said Vance.
He highlighted two issues on which President Trump has said there would be no flexibility.
“On the first of those things, what some people call the dust, which is the enriched uranium that the Iranians currently possess, we have said that we want that to come out of their country, and we would like to take possession of it. Now, why does that matter? That doesn't matter, of course, because they have access to that material now. That access, that material is actually buried underground by Operation Midnight Hammer. But if you think about this over the long haul, the President doesn't want to leave the next President or the President after that to be worrying about this program and so we would like to get that material out of the country completely so that the United States has control of it. That's number one."
The second issue, Vance continued, relates to verification. “It's one thing for the Iranians to say that they're not going to have a nuclear weapon. It's another thing for us to put in place the mechanism to ensure that's not going to happen. Part of that is, of course, to ensure that they don't have the ability to enrich uranium, which is how they got so close to a nuclear weapon before."
“So those are really the two things where, frankly, the Iranians, I think, did make some progress," the Vice President added. “They moved in our direction, which is why I think we would say that we had some good signs, but they didn't move far enough. And so what we decided is, you know what, given that we don't think this current team and this current timeline is going to be able to make a deal, let them go back to Tehran. We're going to go back to Washington. And that's where we are today."
The Vice President made clear that “the ball really is in [the Iranians’] court. We've made clear where we're willing, again, to be accommodating, and we've made clear where we absolutely need to see the nuclear material come out of the country of Iran."
He also said that “in the process of doing this negotiation, I do think that we acquired some knowledge about how the Iranians are negotiating, and this is ultimately why we left Pakistan, because what we figured out is that they were unable, I think, the team that was there, was unable to cut a deal, and they had to go back to Tehran, either from the Supreme Leader or somebody else, and actually get approval to the terms that we had set."
Vance said that “whether we have further conversations, whether we ultimately get to a deal, I really think the ball is in the Iranian court because we put a lot on the table. We actually made very clear what our red lines were. We also made clear that we actually would be very happy, the President of the United States has said he would be very happy if Iran was treated like a normal country, if it had a normal economy, if its people were able to prosper and thrive."
“But in order for Iran to be a normal country economically," he added, “it's going to have to be a normal country from the perspective of not pursuing a nuclear weapon, and it's going to have to be a normal country from not pursuing terrorism. And so, there really is, I think, a grand deal to be had here, but it's up to the Iranians, I think, to take the next step."