JNN 23rd September 2026 New York : At the insistence of the US, Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi has met with the United States’ regional envoy Steve Witkoff on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly’s 81st meeting, sources report .

Iranian state media also confirmed that Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi held a meeting with Witkoff, who was part of the US delegation present on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly.

According to state broadcaster IRIB, the meeting was held at Witkoff’s request.
According to the source, “Iran agreed to Witkoff’s request for the meeting in order to convey Tehran’s conditions for reopening the Strait of Hormuz.”

In a post on X, Witkoff said, “Today, on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly, we engaged in lengthy talks with the Iranian delegation through the mediators, who shuttled between the two sides throughout the day. They successfully completed a round of discussions that we hope will prove constructive and promising. The mediators will continue their work.”

President Trump noted the meeting had lasted for three hours and described it as a “very good meeting.”

Iran’s “firm positions” were communicated to the US representative during the meeting, it noted.

Iran’s conditions :

The source identified the conditions specified by the Islamic Republic during the meeting as the immediate lifting of the illegal naval blockade that the United States has imposed on Iranian ports and vessels, the immediate release of all of Iran’s frozen assets, and “an end to the war on all resistance fronts.”

Iran closed the chokepoint following the launch of the latest round of unprovoked American-Israeli aggression against the country on February 28.

The Islamic Republic and the United States agreed on a 60-day reopening period as part of a Pakistan-mediated memorandum of understanding in June, in which even all the present conditions were agreed by both but they were not implemented earlier in letter & spirit , and were violated by US.

Iran devised the Persian Gulf Strait Authority (PGSA), an authority tasked with managing legal transit through the strait, towards implementation of the understanding, but American violations forced the Islamic Republic to reestablish the closure.

As part of Iran’s efforts at enforcing the closure, the Islamic Republic’s Armed Forces have been targeting the vessels trying to illegally cross the chokepoint under American escort.

Tehran has, meanwhile, warned ship owners, charterers, and buyers against buying into Washington’s pledges of “protection” for the vessels seeking to illegally cross the waterway.