The denial came through IRNA, Iran's state news agency, which cited an unnamed source close to the delegation. Trump had told Axios that he expected negotiations to restart, one day after rejecting Tehran's proposal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz within seven days in exchange for a package of conditions that includes a seven-day regional ceasefire, the unfreezing of Iranian foreign assets, the lifting of oil sanctions, and an end to the US naval blockade of Iranian ports.
IRNA also confirmed that Iran had conveyed its positions to Washington through a Qatari mediator — a channel Axios reported could still host indirect talks — and that the delegation would return to Tehran without having met American counterparts directly.
The strait is the mechanism that makes this standoff consequential beyond the two governments. Roughly 20 percent of global oil and gas moved through it before the conflict that followed US-Israeli strikes on Iran in February. Tehran's closure of the waterway and Washington's counter-blockade of Iranian ports have together created a chokehold on energy supply chains that no amount of diplomatic messaging has yet loosened.
What the Qatari channel can actually carry, given Tehran's public position and Trump's Saturday rejection of Iran's conditions, remains the genuinely open question.
Gabriel Fenech 
Alexandre Noir 
Dua Mifsud