Negotiators for the Iranian government and the P5+1 went on throughout the day today, with 14 hours of serious talks ending with Iran reporting they are “optimistic” about progress in diplomacy.
US officials, on the other hand, insisted that there had been no real progress made over the course of the first day, though they would “hold off” on declaring the talks a failure until they end tomorrow.
Already the talks lasted far longer than the talks in Geneva, which ended after just a few hours with only an agreement on holding the current round of talks in Istanbul. It remains to be seen if a third round will come after this one.
It seems unlikely, however, that Iran will agree to an additional round without some serious progress, as US officials angrily condemned Iran for agreeing to the current talks, saying they proved they were trying to delay the process.
