The Sixty-Day Deferral
The MOU currently under US-Iran negotiation commits Iran to not pursuing a nuclear weapon while deferring HEU disposal to a 60-day post-signing window. Trump has requested amendments covering exactly that mechanism. Iran's parliament has prohibited enrichment halts by legislation. Those three positi
Trump requested edits to the MOU text last week. The specific ask: amendments covering how and when the United States would secure Iran's highly enriched uranium. The current draft does not answer that question. It commits Iran to not pursuing a nuclear weapon, sets enrichment limits as TBD and includes monitoring provisions. HEU disposal is deferred to a 60-day negotiation that opens after both sides sign.
That structure would deliver the deal's financial benefits to Iran before its core weapons question is resolved.
The $24 billion in Iranian funds frozen in accounts worldwide is the immediate issue. Iran demands release upon signature. Trump said explicitly that no money will be exchanged until further notice, citing concern about repeating the 2015 JCPOA optic of front-loading financial concessions before verification. A proposed workaround routes the funds through Gulf states instead of directly from Washington. Iran gets the money, the US avoids the direct payment optic. The Gulf states being asked to participate are the same ones whose infrastructure Iranian forces attacked in the last twelve months. Their contribution is uncertain.
Iran's parliament has legislated against enrichment halts. Pezeshkian's government is negotiating a framework that will require enrichment constraints. A deal signed across that gap either collapses when parliament enforces its own legislation or holds because the ambiguity is politically convenient for both sides. Neither outcome is a closed agreement.
The most consequential variable in the current negotiation is silence. Mojtaba Khamenei, the new Supreme Leader, has not responded to the current draft. He has not responded to Trump's amendments. Presidential-level talks between Pezeshkian's team and Witkoff are provisional until Khamenei's position becomes legible. Everything agreed at that level is subject to revision.
One data point undercuts Iran's negotiating posture. Roughly 50% of Iran's basic goods now transit via Caspian Sea and overland routes rather than through maritime channels. Those routes are less efficient and more expensive. Iran adopted them because the maritime alternative is impaired. Every week the deal remains unsigned compounds that cost in domestic inflation. Iran's posture at the table implies maximum leverage; its logistics adaptation implies a state already absorbing significant blockade pressure.
The Hormuz question is running in parallel. Iran announced it will charge "environmental protection" fees for strait transit rather than formal tolls. The shift is legal positioning. UNCLOS Article 26 prohibits charges on innocent passage except for specific services rendered. An environmental fee structured as a non-discriminatory regulatory charge sits in a different legal category. Whether it holds depends on whether the fee is applied uniformly or selectively by cargo origin and ownership chain. Prior data suggests selective application remains the operating model regardless of the label attached to it.
CENTCOM has escorted approximately 70 commercial vessels through the strait in the last three weeks, a physical challenge to Iranian enforcement running simultaneously with the negotiations. IRGC claims 26 vessels transited under its own coordination protocol. Both escort operations are active on the same waterway.
The 60-day deferral is the MOU's central structural bet: that a second negotiation, opened after signature, can resolve what the first negotiation could not. That bet requires signing to produce enough trust and momentum to close a gap that signing itself leaves open. Iran's parliament has given no indication the bet holds. Neither has the Supreme Leader.