Iran has “fully and completely agreed” to nuclear inspections long into the future, President Donald Trump said Tuesday after Tehran denied making the concession as part of talks on a permanent end to the war between the two countries.
The discrepancy over what had been agreed emerged after Vice President JD Vance echoed the positive assessment of mediators following the first round of high-level negotiations in Switzerland. Washington and Tehran had “laid a very good foundation for a successful final deal,” Vance said Monday.
He said Iran had agreed to allow the U.N. watchdog — the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) — to examine Iranian nuclear sites bombed by the United States last year. And he also said that if Iranian financial assets were unfrozen, they would be used to buy American-grown food.
Trump echoed those claims Tuesday, after fierce denials by Iran.
“If they did not agree to this, there would be no further negotiations,” he wrote on Truth Social. “Based on this and other major concessions being made by Iran, I have agreed to allow the Hormuz Strait to remain OPEN, with no further Naval Blockade,” he added.
Later he told reporters that U.N. nuclear watchdog inspectors will be on the ground in Iran at the “appropriate time.”
His comments came after Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian arrived in Pakistan for talks with officials who have been mediating negotiations between Tehran and Washington on a permanent end to the war in the Middle East, even as violence broke out again in Lebanon.
In Tehran, Iran’s capital, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmail Baghaei told reporters that no visits have been scheduled for the IAEA to examine Iranian nuclear sites bombed by the United States last year.
The IAEA has been in and out of Iran since Israel’s 12-day war in 2025, but has not been granted access to the bombed enrichment sites targeted by the U.S. at the time.
Meanwhile, violence flared again in southern Lebanon as Israeli soldiers opened fire, killing two people. The reports of violence came after two days of calm following a ceasefire brokered on Saturday. Any renewal of heavy fighting could threaten the broader diplomatic talks, since Iran has demanded that a full truce in Lebanon be part of any comprehensive deal.
Iran’s president makes his first visit to Islamabad since the war started
President Asif Ali Zardari, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and other senior officials received Pezeshkian upon his arrival in Islamabad amid tight security, according to Pakistani state media. Television footage showed Pezeshkian embracing Zardari and Sharif as they welcomed him.
This is the Iranian president’s first visit since the conflict started with the U.S. and Israeli attack on Iran on Feb. 28.
In the initial talks, marking the start of a 60-day diplomatic process that seeks to reach a permanent deal to end the Iran war, Iran and the U.S. agreed to create a “de-confliction cell” to address the fighting in Lebanon between Israel and the Iranian-backed Hezbollah militant group. The U.S. said negotiators also discussed “mechanisms” to ensure that the Strait of Hormuz, a key waterway for oil transit that Iran had effectively blocked during the war, remains open.
Ahead of his meetings in Pakistan, Pezeshkian cautioned that “the effectiveness of the talks depends on full commitment to the agreed obligations and their precise implementation.”
“Progress on this path will be measured by practical adherence to accepted responsibilities,” he wrote on X. “Statements outside the agreed text do not help advance the negotiations.”
Iran says negotiation groups focused on sanctions relief, nuclear issues and more
Iran suggested that the ongoing technical talks in Switzerland have led to the creation of specific negotiation groups, including those focused on sanctions relief, nuclear issues, reconstruction, and monitoring, according to the state-run IRNA news agency.
The report quoted Kazem Gharibabadi, a deputy foreign minister leading the technical talks, saying that the countries involved also formed a contact mechanism over ships moving through the Strait of Hormuz and over the fighting in Lebanon between Israel and Hezbollah.
It remains unclear whether the deconfliction cell being created will be enough to stop fighting between the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah and Israel, which occupies part of Lebanon and insists it must maintain a free hand to attack militants launching attacks into northern Israel.
Israeli forces opened fire and killed two men in the southern Lebanese town of Nabatiyeh al-Fawqa on Tuesday, Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency reported, adding the pair were next to a bulldozer that was clearing the road at the time.
Separately, the agency said Israeli troops fired on residents on the outskirts of the town of Hadatha as they were heading to carry out a burial in the town’s ceremony with a Lebanese army escort.
There was no immediate comment from Israel.
Discrepancy on Iran’s use of unfrozen funds
Following the high-level talks in Switzerland, Vance had said if Iranian financial assets were unfrozen, they would be used to buy American-grown food.
Vance said that the U.S. and Qatar would have approval over the process, but if Iranian money becomes accessible as sanctions are lifted, it “would actually go to buy American soy, American corn and American wheat for the benefit of the Iranian people.”
“It is interesting that the philosophy and goal of the war, which was the destruction of the Iranian civilization and the collapse of Iran, has become enriching American farmers,” Baghaei said at the news conference in Tehran.
Iran’s ambassador in Geneva, Ali Bahreini, also questioned Vance’s contention that the U.S. and Qatar would have to approve how Iran uses unfrozen funds.
“Iran is the only country who decides what to do with those assets,” he told reporters.
Netanyahu raises new questions over fragile Lebanon ceasefire
Mediators Pakistan and Qatar said the cell would include the Lebanese government and would “ensure the adherence of the termination of military operations in Lebanon,” but Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu raised new questions late on Monday, saying his military still has “full freedom of action to thwart any direct or emerging threat to them or to the residents of the north.”
Neither Israel nor Hezbollah is a signatory to the U.S.-Iran deal, and Netanyahu has vowed to keep his forces in southern Lebanon until any threat to Israel is eliminated. Hezbollah has refused to halt attacks unless Israel commits to withdrawing.
When asked about Netanyahu’s comments, U.S. President Donald Trump later said “we’re going to take a look at it,” adding that he wouldn’t say what action he would take but that the situation would “get solved.”
“I’m a problem solver, I get problems solved real fast, including with Bibi,” he said, using a nickname for Netanyahu.
No Israeli airstrikes or shelling have been reported since Sunday, a day after a ceasefire was reached, and Hezbollah also has not claimed any attacks in what has been the longest halt in the fighting since the latest Israel-Hezbollah war erupted on March 2.
Lebanon and Israel planned another round of direct talks in Washington on Tuesday, which are expected to focus on developing a plan for an Israeli withdrawal.
