Trump envoys converge on Switzerland as US-Iran follow-up talks near restart

By Seo Ji-yeon, The Herald Business

Key US figures are converging on Switzerland, raising expectations that the first follow-up negotiations between Washington and Tehran could soon resume after being postponed once since the two sides signed a ceasefire memorandum of understanding.

Steve Witkoff, Donald Trump's Middle East envoy, is traveling to Switzerland, where working-level talks with Iran are expected to be held, according to Axios on Thursday local time.

A US government official said Jared Kushner — Trump's son-in-law and a close participant in Middle East diplomacy — had already arrived in Switzerland.

Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, Qatar's prime minister and foreign minister, who has been serving as a key mediator between Washington and Tehran, has also arrived in the country, according to reports.

The two sides had originally planned to hold their first working-level talks at the Swiss resort of Bürgenstock shortly after signing the ceasefire MOU, with discussions set to cover limits on Iran's nuclear program, sanctions relief and the release of frozen assets.

Those talks were abruptly postponed, however, as fighting between Israel and the Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah continued in Lebanon.

Iran lodged strong objections, arguing that Israel's military operations in Lebanon violated the spirit of the MOU. The US side also said that a schedule for the talks had not yet been finalized.

The White House on Thursday officially announced that Vice President J.D. Vance would delay his trip to Switzerland, but reaffirmed Washington's commitment to the process, saying the US delegation was "ready to depart at the earliest possible opportunity."

Whether Vance, who had been expected to lead the negotiating team, will ultimately attend in person remains unclear.

If the talks go ahead, the two sides are expected to focus within a 60-day negotiating window on how Iran will dispose of its highly enriched uranium, the framework for International Atomic Energy Agency verification, the scope of sanctions relief, and the return of frozen assets.

The MOU is primarily a political agreement centered on halting hostilities and normalizing shipping through the Strait of Hormuz. That means hammering out concrete implementation plans on the core issues will be the central challenge of the follow-up talks.

Analysts caution, however, that the path ahead will not be smooth. The Lebanon front remains unstable, and Iran's supreme leader Mojtaba Khamenei recently warned that Tehran would never accept what he called unreasonable US demands.

Markets are watching closely: if the Switzerland talks do take place, expectations for easing Middle East tensions could revive, but a prolonged delay or breakdown could trigger renewed volatility in oil prices and financial markets.