Iranian Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, who also heads the negotiating team with the United States, has rejected President Donald Trump's claim that Tehran's frozen assets would only be used to buy American agricultural products.
“The US is wrong to say that our frozen assets will buy their crops,” Ghalibaf wrote on social media platform X on June 26. He added: “The only crop we harvest is what you [the US] have sown: decades of mistrust. It is organic, abundant, and harvested by us.”
Ghalibaf also criticized Washington for only “exporting genetically modified soybeans, broken promises, and rude rhetoric.”
The statement came after President Trump confirmed that the initial financial relief under the Pakistan-mediated Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) would include $500 million in U.S. goods. He emphasized that no cash would go directly to Tehran, and that the funds would be used to buy corn and wheat from American farmers to address Iran's “hunger problem.”
U.S. Vice President JD Vance said that if Iran's assets were frozen, “they will be used to make American farmers richer and to feed the Iranian people.” U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, speaking alongside Bahraini leaders in Manama on June 26, said the U.S. seeks a deal that does not harm the security or prosperity of the U.S. and its regional allies.
However, Iranian state and semi-official media have rejected the U.S. administration's narrative, framing the framework agreement as a strategic victory rather than a concession. Mehr News Agency quoted Ghalibaf during a diplomatic visit to Baku describing the MOU as “a declaration of U.S. defeat,” insisting the document contains no legal provisions mandating the purchase of U.S. goods.
Earlier, the governor of the Central Bank of Iran said on June 24 that funds released under the deal with the U.S. would not necessarily be limited to essential goods. Tensions over the implementation of the deal continue as both sides negotiate the details of the Iran-U.S. Memorandum of Understanding. The Pakistan-mediated agreement began on June 18 after the electronic signatures of President Trump and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian.
