Vice President JD Vance meets top Iranian officials to begin peace talks, seeking to ‘change relations in the Middle East permanently’

U.S. Vice President JD Vance on Sunday is meeting with top Iranian officials as the White House looks to build out the interim deal to end the war in Iran reached by the two sides last week. Vance was expected to meet with Tehran’s negotiators, including parliamentary speaker Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf and Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, at a Swiss mountainside resort near Lake Lucerne. Mediators from Pakistan and Qatar were also in the room for the direct engagement. Iranian officials appeared to avoid being seen during a brief appearance by Vance in front of reporters before the start of the talks. IRIB, the Iranian state broadcaster, announced the four-way talks had begun shortly after Vance delivered a statement to media and took a couple of questions from reporters. The U.S. side is looking to get Iran locked into negotiations over its nuclear program. But the on-again, off-again conflict in Lebanon, between Israel and Iranian-backed Hezbollah militants, continues to threaten to derail the effort for the U.S. to win concessions from Tehran on its nuclear program and keep the Strait of Hormuz open. Iran’s main focus during negotiations on Sunday would be the ongoing war between Israel and Lebanon, Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmail Baghaei told Iran’s state news agency ahead of the meeting with Vance. The framework was signed last week, and now top American and Iranian negotiators are in a 60-day sprint to reach an agreement on the technical details that hold massive implications for the world economy and global security. Yet only days after signing the agreement, it is being stress-tested after fighting escalated in Lebanon between Israel and the Iranian-backed militant group Hezbollah — and by the subsequent announcement by Iran’s military that it had again closed the vital waterway that transits one-fifth of the world’s traded oil and natural gas. A renewed ceasefire in Lebanon, brokered on Saturday, appeared to be holding up. “The question before us now