An Iranian lawmaker has warned that failed negotiations between Iran and the United States could trigger inflation in the market.
“If the negotiations reach a deadlock, we will witness the effects of psychological inflation in the market, so measures must be taken now to control the situation,” said Mostafa Pourdehghan, who represents Ardakan in the central Yazd province.
Pourdehghan also pointed to recent remarks by Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, suggesting that the United States has not maintained a consistent position between what it says in the negotiations and what it expresses publicly.
“This means it is difficult to be optimistic about the talks under these conditions,” he said.


Iranian commentators are floating a long-standing proposal to break the impasse in its nuclear negotiations with Washington: the formation of a regional nuclear consortium involving Iran, Arab states and the United States.
If Tehran has indeed introduced this idea in the fourth round of talks, it may represent new flexibility on the sticky point of enrichment and explain the positive assessment of both Iranian and American officials on the latest round of talks.
A commentary in the conservative Khorasan daily on Monday said the idea of creating a consortium may have been among what Omani Foreign Minister Badr al-Busaidi referred to as “useful and original ideas reflecting a shared wish to reach an honorable agreement” after the completion of the fourth round of talks on Sunday.
Some signals suggest this idea may have been quietly floated in diplomatic channels: ahead of the Muscat talks on April 11, Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi visited Riyadh and Doha, followed by a trip to the UAE after the talks.
The idea was originally proposed by former Iranian nuclear negotiator Seyed Hossein Mousavian and Princeton physicist Frank von Hippel long before the current Tehran-Washington talks in an October 2023 article in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.
Such a body consisting of Iran, Saudi Arabia,and other interested Middle Eastern countries would oversee enrichment under international safeguards and ensure that the enriched uranium it produced would be used only for peaceful purposes, they argued.
On the eve of the April 11 nuclear talks in Muscat, Mousavian addressed the risk of failure if the US refused to acknowledge Iran’s rights under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).
“Steve Witkoff recently made an unreasonable statement, saying that Iran cannot benefit from the right to peaceful uranium enrichment technology. This stance is a clear violation of the NPT treaty. If this is the final US position, tomorrow's negotiations... will end in failure,” he warned.
In the same post, Mousavian again floated the consortium idea: “The solution is ... the establishment of a joint nuclear consortium among the Persian Gulf countries.” He argued this would resolve the US’s contradictory stance of supporting enrichment in Saudi Arabia while denying the same to Iran.
He also hinted at a broader vision: an Iran-US economic agreement worth up to $1 trillion, involving American investment in Iran’s nuclear, fossil, and renewable energy sectors. Such a deal, he suggested, could help “open the deadlock in US–Iran relations.”
Some commentators have described the idea as a possibility for a breakthrough.
“Araqhchi's visit to Saudi Arabia and the UAE is probably not unrelated to the proposal to create a joint regional enrichment consortium,” Rahman Ghahremanpour, a commentator and analyst of Middle East politics in Tehran, posted on X.
“Iran is trying to break the deadlock on zero enrichment, and if the countries in the region agree to this proposal, perhaps the Trump administration will change its position. This is an important confidence-building measure in arms control,” he added.
Abdolreza Davari, a conservative politician who supports Pezeshkian, also supported the idea in a post on X on May 10. This, he said, would be “similar to the model implemented in Europe that supplies fuel even to the United States.”
“This consortium could be the center of regional cooperation in the areas of nuclear technology exchange, safety, environment, production of fresh water and radiopharmaceuticals, and also include a regional non-proliferation regime," Reza Nasri, another commentator in Tehran, wrote on X before Araghchi’s visit to Riyadh.
Hossein Aghaei, a Turkey-based senior security and geopolitics analyst, referred to Saudi Arabia’s wish to create a consortium in collaboration with the US and possibly Russia in a post on X on May 8. He said Iran could be a participant in the consortium to ensure it will not be able to build nukes.
However, he warned that Israel’s vision is completely different. “In the nuclear matter, Israel may not even trust Saudi Arabia, let alone the Islamic Republic.”
The United States on Monday issued new sanctions against one Iranian entity and three individuals it alleged contributed it Iranian nuclear activities with potential military uses.
An announcement by the US Treasury listed the company as Fuya Pars Prospective Technologists, also known as Ideal Vacuum Store.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio elaborated on the move in a statement.
"Today, the Department of State is sanctioning three Iranian nationals and one Iranian entity with ties to Iran’s Organization of Defensive Innovation and Research, which is known by its Persian acronym, SPND – the direct successor organization to Iran’s pre-2004 nuclear weapons program, also referred to as the Amad Project."
"All individuals sanctioned are involved in activities that materially contribute to, or pose a risk of materially contributing to, the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction," he added.
It’s impossible to give a timeline for when this will be resolved or what the outcome will be. We are trying," said Majid Takht-Ravanchi, deputy foreign minister for political affairs. "We believe the path we’re on is the right one, though there are many challenges."
"Economically, the country is in a difficult state, and our people are under sanctions that we believe are deeply unjust," Takht-Ravanchi added during an appearance at the Tehran International Book Fair.
"Our effort in the diplomatic apparatus is, within our capacity and in line with national policies and the guidelines given to us, to use our expertise to lift these sanctions."

Commentator in Tehran are warning that Iran’s economy has become to dependent on news from Washington, with markets reacting sharply even to personnel changes in the US president’s inner circle.
Iran's official strategy to jumpstart a sputtering economy must look beyond talks with Washington and address root problems, several analysts and editorials have said.
“The reality is that our economy reacts intensely to political developments,” former central bank deputy Kamal Seyyed-Ali told reporters in Tehran. “If the possibility of a full-scale war rises again, the dollar rate will once again break records.”
Seyyed-Ali, a senior economist, pointed to a March spike in the dollar-to-rial exchange rate—reaching 1.05 million—after Donald Trump warned of possible military action if Tehran refused to negotiate.
The rate dropped when talks began in Oman, then crept back up when negotiations stalled. This increasing sensitivity, he said, underscores how economic expectations in Iran have become “tethered to political headlines.”
Policymakers and markets alike, he added, are behaving as if diplomacy with Washington will dictate the fate of the economy.
The hardline daily Kayhan recently questioned the government’s economic strategy, asking in a published commentary: “What is the government doing besides negotiating with the United States?”
The paper argued that diplomacy should be a tool to improve economic performance, not a substitute for internal reform.
Inflated hopes for a post-deal recovery have masked structural failings—among them, a banking system in crisis, outdated industry, underinvestment in agriculture, and widespread dysfunction in pensions and public services.
Repeated blackouts caused by power shortages have disrupted everything from water distribution to digital connectivity, triggering price hikes in housing, transport, and healthcare.
Energy Minister Abbas Aliabadi admitted in April that Iran’s power plants can generate only 65,000 megawatts against annual demand of more than 85,000. A vicious cycle compounds the problem: water shortages disable power plants, while power cuts prevent water distribution.
Citizens have voiced growing anger through Persian-language media abroad. Callers to Iran International describe how outages in major cities now affect phone signals, Internet access, and even access to clean water.
The latest round of US sanctions targets the petrochemical sector—already plagued by multi-billion-dollar corruption scandals. While the judiciary has acknowledged these cases, many remain suppressed or unresolved, a fact critics say reflects both impunity and systemic failure.
Despite poor growth and repeated economic shocks—Iran’s industrial output contracted 1.6% in January—officials continue to blame sanctions alone. Few in power acknowledge the depth of mismanagement. Instead, each government accuses its predecessor, avoiding accountability as public frustration mounts.
Even if sanctions are eased, economists say, Iran’s crisis will not be resolved by diplomacy alone. Without tackling the roots—corruption, dysfunction, and decay—any recovery will be fragile, temporary, and externally dependent.
"They lie over and over and over again. It's worth noting the Ayatollah right now today, is actively trying to murder Donald J. Trump, has hired hit men trying to murder the president United States," Senator Ted Cruz said in an interview on Fox News.
"These are not people who can be trusted, which is why the objective must be full dismantlement, must be the centrifuges disassembled, destroyed, taken out."
The US Justice Department in November unsealed murder-for-hire charges against an Afghan national it said was tasked by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps with assassinating Trump.
"President Trump is in a position to demand a good Iran deal because the Ayatollahs are scared to death of him," Senator Tom Cotton wrote on X.
"That's why Iran tried to kill him. And President Trump has been very clear: Iran must never have a nuclear weapon," the Arkansas Republican added.





