When the United States opened direct talks with Iran in mid-May, it had trouble determining Tehran’s true position. Seeking clarity, the Donald Trump administration established a direct secret channel with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps to verify if Iranian negotiators — Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf and Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi — were in fact speaking on the military’s behalf.
The person tapped for the backchannel was Nechirvan Barzani, president of the Kurdistan region in Iraq, who is trusted by both the United States and the IRGC, several sources “with direct knowledge of the matter” told Axios.
The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) administers a semi-autonomous region of northern Iraq and is headquartered in Erbil. Barzani lived in Iran during the Iran-Iraq War, where he studied at the University of Tehran. Using the phone, Barzani established contact with Vahidi and asked him if he was aligned with the Iranian negotiators. We prefer to solve this crisis through negotiations.
It was then Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard who first established contact with Barzani around May 10. On May 14, an IRGC official met Barzani in his office in Erbil and gave him an encrypted phone to conduct a secure call, the report said.
He, according to the US media report, is fluent in Farsi and has personal relationships with many senior members of the Iranian regime, including top members of the IRGC. Gabbard reportedly told the Iraqi leader that the Trump administration needed his help to get in touch with IRGC commander General Ahmad Vahidi. A source told Axios that Gabbard clearly told Barzani that she was making the call with the approval of President Trump and Vice President Vance. The IRGC commander replied in the affirmative and said, “I fully support them, and this is also the position of the IRGC. After receiving the Iranian response, the Trump administration again reached Barzani with another proposal to host secret talks between senior US and Iranian negotiators in Erbil, the report said.
