Qatar Negotiators Depart for Tehran to Ease Tensions to Resume US-Iran Talks

US military/DOK USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN 72)

JAKARTA - Qatari negotiators have left for Iran to meet with officials there in an effort to ease tensions and create conditions for the resumption of US-Iranian negotiations.

This information was conveyed by a diplomat who knew about the visit to CNN, Friday, July 10.

"The visit is planned through coordination with the United States," said the source.

On Friday, there was a pause in the fighting after a series of escalating attacks had threatened to derail the US-Iranian deal. The mediator is now trying to bring the two sides back to the negotiating table.

Previously, a US official told CNN that the military deliberately carried out the attack and then stopped it for a moment to avoid escalation and give room for diplomacy to work.

Meanwhile, Anadolu quoted various sources from the mediator countries and US officials as telling Axios, the governments in the region have been trying to ease tensions between the two conflicting countries.

Sources said officials from Qatar, Pakistan, Egypt and Saudi Arabia made several phone calls with US and Iranian officials on Wednesday in an effort to reduce tensions.

"There have been extensive diplomatic efforts to first agree on de-escalation with both sides and then set a date for the next round of negotiations between technical teams," a regional source involved in the mediation said.

A source from one of the mediating countries said the mediators believed that Iran's recent attack in the Strait of Hormuz was carried out by parties in the Iranian regime who opposed the memorandum of understanding between the US and Iran and sought to disrupt it.

Iran and the US have launched reciprocal attacks over the past two days amid an escalation after Iran's attack on three merchant ships in the Strait of Hormuz.

Tehran then launched a series of attacks on Thursday against US military infrastructure in Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, and Jordan in response to the US attacks on the second day.