Khamenei’s MoU stance stirs debate as Iran and US meet in Switzerland

Tehran, Iran – Senior negotiators from Iran and the United States are in Switzerland to advance the signed memorandum of understanding (MoU) to end the war launched by the US and Israel in late February. Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf and Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi led the Iranian delegation in Sunday’s high-level talks mediated by Pakistan and Qatar, with Vice President JD Vance heading the US team. But back in Tehran, opponents of the deal continued to argue about Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei’s reluctant stance on the MoU. “I, as a matter of principle, held a different view,” said a short written statement attributed to Khamenei on Thursday, in what has been his only public reaction to this week’s MoU with the US. But, he added, he approved it after President Masoud Pezeshkian accepted responsibility. On Sunday, the director general of the Islamic Republic of Iran News Network (IRINN), the main news channel of state television, resigned after the station broadcast a live interview with Mahmoud Nabavian, a hardline cleric, legislator and member of Iran’s negotiating team during an earlier round of talks in Pakistan in April. To rally backing for his opposition to the MoU, Nabavian read lines from what he claimed was correspondence between Khamenei and unnamed top officials in the Supreme National Security Council in March and April. …