Is Donald Trump Spreading 'Fake News'? Iran Denies Secret Negotiations to End War

Donald Trump was accused of peddling misinformation on Monday after the US president told reporters that Washington and Tehran had reached 'major points of agreement' over ending the war. Iran's most senior parliamentary official publicly denied that any such talks had occurred and accused the White House of using the claim to manipulate global oil and financial markets.

The conflict began on 28 February 2026 when the United States and Israel launched coordinated military strikes against Iranian targets. The weeks that followed brought a sharp escalation on all fronts.

Tehran moved to restrict passage through the Strait of Hormuz, oil prices surged to a four-year high, and Trump issued a 48-hour ultimatum demanding Iran fully reopen the waterway or face strikes on its power infrastructure including what he described as its 'biggest and most important' power plant.

What Donald Trump Actually Said

Speaking to reporters, Trump insisted there had been 'very, very strong talks' between Washington and Tehran over the previous 24 hours, adding that Iran 'wanted very much to make a deal.'

He described the discussions as 'very good and productive,' announced a five-day pause on planned US strikes on Iranian energy facilities, and said the two sides were edging towards a complete and total resolution of our hostilities in the Middle East.' In Trump's account, a diplomatic breakthrough was not merely possible but close.

Iran's response arrived swiftly and left little room for charitable reading. Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, speaker of the Iranian parliament, posted directly on X that 'No negotiations have been held with the US, and fake news is used to manipulate the financial and oil markets and escape the quagmire in which the US and Israel are trapped.'

Iran's foreign ministry reinforced the denial through state news agency IRNA, with a spokesperson confirming that while 'friendly' countries had relayed messages expressing Washington's desire for talks, Tehran had not responded to those overtures. That distinction between a message passed through intermediaries and a negotiation actually taking place was clearly one Tehran considered important to make.

The Tangled Diplomacy Around Trump's Claims

What makes the contradiction particularly difficult to untangle is that Ghalibaf, the official calling the reports fake news, was simultaneously identified by multiple outlets as the man reportedly at the centre of the back-channel contact. Reuters cited an Israeli official who said Ghalibaf was personally leading engagement with Washington.

Axios went further, reporting that US sources described active communication with the parliamentary speaker and outlined plans for a potential meeting in Pakistan involving Vice President JD Vance, special envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner. Whether those contacts constitute negotiations in any meaningful sense, or merely an exploratory exchange through a series of proxies, remains contested.

The markets did not wait for the nuance. Oil prices, which had climbed sharply on fears that Hormuz might be fully blockaded, fell back sharply after Trump's remarks circulated, with gas prices also easing as traders interpreted his language as signalling reduced tensions.

That movement is precisely what Ghalibaf was pointing at. His accusation was not simply that Trump was wrong but that the remarks served as a deliberate tool to move commodities, whether or not a deal actually existed.

On the ground none of this translated into calm. Israel said it had carried out 'wide-scale' strikes across Iran on the same day Trump described productive conversations, and Tehran responded by firing missiles towards the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and other regional targets.

Iranian officials framed Trump's five-day pause not as a product of diplomacy but as evidence he had 'backed down' following a firm warning from Tehran. On the Strait of Hormuz, Iran maintained that the waterway remained open, while quietly clarifying that access would not extend to vessels linked to countries it considers hostile, a condition that rather undermines the claim of unimpeded passage.

The gap between Trump's account and Tehran's is now so wide that one of them appears to be either deeply mistaken or, as Ghalibaf put it, deliberately fabricating events. That contradiction is complicated by the fact that the Iranian parliamentary speaker whom Iran has named as proof that no talks exist was reportedly the same figure American officials were preparing to engage in back‑channel contact in Pakistan, according to multiple news reports.