Iran wants its frozen billions back, Washington keeps the key

A financial standoff shaping everything else

Behind the images of delegations crossing paths in Doha, there is a far more prosaic, almost accounting-level battle that could nonetheless determine the outcome of the entire diplomatic process between Tehran and Washington: the fate of billions of dollars in Iranian assets frozen for years in overseas accounts. According to a report published by the Foundation for Defense of Democracies on July 1, 2026, Iran is actively pushing for the release of these funds, tying its future "performance" to the implementation of the memorandum of understanding signed with the United States.

This memorandum, in effect since June 18, 2026, serves as the general framework for negotiating every outstanding issue between the two countries: sanctions relief, the nuclear file, reopening the Strait of Hormuz, and broader regional security arrangements.

An Iranian economy running on fumes

Tehran's insistence on this financial file is not a mere protocol detail. It reflects a brutal economic reality: years of sanctions have emptied the Iranian state's coffers, making even a partial release of these assets vital to stabilizing a weakened national currency and calming growing public discontent.

Not a dollar released without conditions met

According to a US official cited by Israeli broadcaster i24NEWS, Iranian assets will remain frozen until the conditions of the memorandum of understanding are fully met. This is not an ambiguous position: Washington has clearly stated that any released funds would be reserved exclusively for the purchase of American agricultural products, a restriction that locks down the use of that money far beyond a mere symbolic thaw.

This approach turns the financial question into a tool of continuous pressure rather than a one-time negotiated trade-off. Until Iran has proven good faith across the entire memorandum, the money remains out of reach.

Verify before rewarding, the guiding logic

This American philosophy — verify before rewarding — fits a long-standing tradition of distrust toward Iranian commitments, fed by decades of nuclear negotiations marked by broken deals and renewed enrichment activities.

Trilateral meetings that exclude Washington

According to Iran's deputy foreign minister, Kazem Gharibabadi, follow-up meetings were held Wednesday in Doha between the Iranian, Qatari, and Pakistani delegations, with no direct American presence at all. These exchanges focused on implementing the memorandum, with particular attention paid to the situation in Lebanon and the release of frozen Iranian assets.

This American absence from the negotiating table is not trivial. It could reflect either a Washington wish to let regional mediators move forward without the symbolic pressure of a direct presence, or a temporary strategic pullback while other diplomatic priorities occupy the American agenda.

Diverging accounts of the same process

The latest statements from both camps highlight different versions of the memorandum's implementation process, an ambiguity that illustrates the fragility of this diplomatic architecture, built through indirect negotiations and third-party mediation.

A text that covers four explosive files at once

The memorandum of understanding that took effect on June 18, 2026 attempts to simultaneously address the easing of economic sanctions, the question of Iran's nuclear program, the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz to international maritime traffic, and broader regional security arrangements potentially touching Lebanon and other theaters of Iranian influence.

Holding these four files together within a single diplomatic framework is an ambitious bet. Any one of them could, on its own, derail the entire process if either side believes the other is not honoring its commitments on a specific point.

An architecture that tests everyone's patience

This structural complexity partly explains the slow pace of the process. Every advance on one front must be weighed against progress, or the lack of it, on the other three, creating a constant diplomatic balancing act between Washington, Tehran, and their mediators.

Billions that could shift Iran's internal balance of power

While the exact amounts remain difficult to establish with certainty in the public documents available, the scale of Iranian assets frozen internationally for years represents a considerable sum for a national economy drained after years of cumulative sanctions. The mere fact that Tehran has made it a top negotiating priority says a great deal about its internal strategic importance.

Even a partial release could offer the Iranian government an economic lifeline capable of defusing some public discontent, while bolstering the internal legitimacy of the negotiators who have championed this file before Iranian public opinion.

A matter of domestic politics as much as foreign diplomacy

For the new Iranian leadership, which must manage the transition period following the death of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, securing a concrete financial gesture from Washington would be a powerful political argument to shore up its credibility, both domestically and among the regime's most conservative factions.

Decades of broken deals weigh on every current gesture

The frozen assets file cannot be understood without revisiting the long history of American-Iranian relations, marked by repeated cycles of negotiations, partial deals, then abrupt ruptures. Each camp approaches this new round carrying the bitter memory of past unmet commitments, which explains the rigidity of the conditions Washington has set on the precise use of any released funds.

This mutual distrust turns every technical negotiation, however minor, into an exercise in managing trust rather than simple financial arbitration. Both sides know that the smallest gesture will be scrutinized, interpreted, and potentially turned against the other camp if things later fail.

A regional context that amplifies every decision

This climate of distrust is further reinforced by the broader regional context, where the military strikes exchanged the previous weekend between the two countries are a reminder that the current diplomatic window remains extremely fragile and reversible at any moment.

Lebanon, a related but inseparable file

The explicit mention of Lebanon in the trilateral discussions in Doha is a reminder that Iran's financial file can never be entirely isolated from Tehran's broader regional influence, particularly through its network of alliances in the Levant. Any financial gesture toward Iran carries potential repercussions for its capacity to fund its regional proxies.

It is precisely this interconnection that makes Washington so cautious about the final use of released funds: ensuring they serve exclusively agricultural imports, not indirectly fueling regional influence networks hostile to Western and Israeli interests.

A vigilance that must also cover the Russian file

Iran remains a recognized supplier of military technology to Russia in its war against Ukraine. Any financial easing toward Tehran must be weighed against this reality: every Iranian dollar saved elsewhere could indirectly free up additional resources for its military cooperation programs with Moscow.

Internal pressure on the negotiators

Beyond Kazem Gharibabadi's official statements, several voices within Iran's political apparatus are demanding tangible, fast results on this financial file, arguing that the concessions Tehran has already made since the war ended in June deserve an immediate concrete trade-off rather than promises deferred indefinitely.

This internal impatience narrows the room to maneuver for Iranian negotiators, caught between the need to maintain a firm posture toward Washington and public pressure for visible short-term economic results.

A political calendar imposing itself on the diplomatic one

The period of national mourning following the death of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei adds another layer of complexity, as Iranian authorities must simultaneously manage a sensitive internal political transition and crucial economic negotiations with their historic adversary.

A framework agreement, not a final settlement

It is essential to remember that the June 18 memorandum is only a general framework for negotiation, not a final agreement settling every dispute. This nuance, often forgotten in media coverage, explains why every new technical meeting generates as much expectation as potential disappointment.

The most experienced observers of the Iranian file regularly point out that memorandums of this kind have, in the past, often served as mere declarations of intent rather than genuine binding commitments, a precedent that calls for caution about current expectations.

Verification that will take time

Verifying Iran's full compliance with the memorandum's conditions, across files as varied as the nuclear program, sanctions, and regional security, will necessarily take time, a delay Tehran might consider politically costly given its economic urgency.

A partial, conditional release, the most likely scenario

The most plausible scenario for the coming months remains a partial, strictly framed release of Iranian funds, limited to American agricultural purchases as announced, rather than a general release of assets. Such a compromise would let Washington demonstrate a form of good faith while retaining significant leverage over the other parts of the file.

Such a scenario would give Tehran an important symbolic gain without fully loosening the grip of sanctions, a fragile but potentially workable balance for both camps in the short term.

The risk of prolonged deadlock if trust erodes

Conversely, if either side believes the other is not honoring its share of the memorandum on the nuclear program or the Strait of Hormuz, the entire financial file could remain blocked indefinitely, reviving tensions and pushing back any prospect of lasting normalization.

A consistency test for the doctrine of conditional firmness

How Washington handles this financial file will be watched far beyond the Iranian case alone. It will send a signal to other authoritarian regimes about the credibility of the American doctrine of tying every economic gesture to verifiable proof of good faith rather than mere diplomatic promises.

Success on this file could strengthen Washington's position in other sensitive negotiations, while failure or a concession seen as too hasty would weaken its financial deterrence power against other strategic adversaries.

A consistency to maintain against every authoritarian regime

This rigor must apply equally, whether the file concerns Iran, Russia, or North Korea, or the credibility of America's doctrine of conditional firmness will be seriously damaged on the international stage.

An attentive but sidelined Europe

Washington's European partners are following this file closely, without playing a visibly leading role in the negotiations reported so far. This relative European discretion contrasts with the more direct involvement of Qatar and Pakistan as the process's preferred mediators.

Some analysts see this as a deliberate Washington choice: keeping exclusive control of such a sensitive file rather than multiplying actors and potentially conflicting negotiating lines.

A transatlantic coordination not to be overlooked

Even so, closer transatlantic coordination on this financial file could strengthen the West's collective credibility toward Iran, avoiding any signal of division that Tehran could exploit to extract further concessions.

A leading indicator of the whole process's solidity

The fate of frozen Iranian assets is, in reality, one of the best available indicators for measuring the real solidity of the diplomatic process underway since June. Unlike verbal statements, which are easily reversible, a financial release is a material commitment hard to cancel without major political consequences for both camps.

That is why this file, seemingly technical and accounting-focused, deserves attention just as sustained as the more spectacular negotiations over the nuclear program or the Strait of Hormuz: it reveals, better than any speech, the real level of trust between the two capitals.

A reliable gauge for the months ahead

Watching the pace and scale of any financial release in the coming weeks will make it possible to measure, far more reliably than official statements, whether this diplomatic process is truly advancing or gradually stalling.

Financial firmness as a lasting deterrence tool

This file illustrates a broader lesson for the whole of Western doctrine toward authoritarian regimes: economic and financial levers often remain more effective and more lasting than diplomatic statements alone in achieving verifiable changes in behavior.

This lesson applies to Iran, but it applies just as much to Russia, whose economy continues to be weighed down by Western sanctions, imperfect as they are, limiting its ability to sustainably fund its war effort in Ukraine.

A consistency to defend on every front

The West cannot afford to apply strict financial firmness toward Iran while tolerating sanctions evasion toward Russia, or its overall strategic credibility will be seriously undermined.

Money, the ultimate revealer of diplomatic trust

The fate of the frozen Iranian billions of dollars will remain, in the months ahead, one of the most reliable barometers of the solidity of the diplomatic process underway between Washington and Tehran. Far more than spectacular statements or protocol meetings, it is this quiet financial file that will determine whether mutual trust is genuinely advancing or remains, as it has for decades, structurally fragile.

A vigilance the entire West must maintain

Whatever the outcome of this financial standoff, the West must keep closely monitoring the actual use of any released funds, bearing in mind that every dollar freed for Iran also carries potential repercussions for the broader strategic balance involving Russia, China, and North Korea.

By Maxime Marquette, columnist

Editorial stance

I am not a journalist but a columnist and analyst. My expertise lies in observing and analysing the geopolitical, economic and strategic dynamics that shape our world. My work is to take political strategies apart, to understand global economic movements, to put the decisions of international actors in context and to offer analytical perspectives on the changes that are redefining our societies.

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