• US official says ongoing trade talks on positive track.
• Curbing Russian oil purchase crucial to reduce tariffs: negotiators.
• India needs more work to address US concerns: US official.

The United States trade negotiators have told their Indian counterparts that curbing purchases of Russian oil is crucial to reducing India’s tariff rate and sealing a trade deal, two people familiar with the talks told Reuters.

While trade negotiations are on a positive track, a US official said, more work is needed to ensure India addresses US concerns over market access, the trade deficit and purchases of Russian oil.

US President Donald Trump has sought to pressure India, the European Union and members of Nato to curb purchases of Russian oil as a way to cut Moscow’s revenue and hasten an end to the war in Ukraine.

The Trump administration has shown a willingness to use maximum leverage to advance its policy goals, as evidenced by it linking trade negotiations with India to demands that it curb Russian oil purchases.

Trump has expressed growing frustration over the slow progress toward ending Russia’s war in Ukraine, a conflict he pledged to resolve from his first day in office.

The US has imposed an extra 25% tariff on imports from India to pressure New Delhi to halt its purchases of discounted Russian crude oil, bringing total punitive duties on Indian goods to 50% and souring trade negotiations between the two democracies.

But Trump has refrained from imposing additional tariffs on Chinese imports over China’s purchases of Russian oil, as his administration navigates a delicate trade truce with Beijing.

India and China are the two largest buyers of Russian oil, which is already subject to numerous US sanctions that have constrained Moscow’s access to global markets.

In response, India has defended its oil imports, emphasising the economic benefits and accusing Western nations of hypocrisy for continuing trade with Russia despite sanctions.

Iran’s senior security official has stated that Tehran will terminate its cooperation with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and cease participation in international weapons inspections if the ‘snapback’ mechanism is enforced and United Nations sanctions are re-imposed.

Secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council (SNSC) Ali Larijani made the remark in a September 22 interview with the PBS — the American public broadcaster and non-commercial, free-to-air television network.

“If ‘snapback’ mechanisms are enforced, we will end our participation with the IAEA,” he said.

Larijani reiterated Iran’s firm determination not to pursue a nuclear weapon — either now or in the future — and said the acts of aggression by the United States and Israel against three Iranian nuclear facilities in June had made negotiations a “farce”.

On Friday, the UN Security Council will convene to vote on a resolution proposed by Russia and China to postpone the reimposition of sanctions.

Should the council fail to approve the resolution, the United Nations ‘snapback’ sanctions will be triggered on Saturday.

On September 9, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi and IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi reached an agreement on practical modalities to resume cooperation after a meeting in the Egyptian capital of Cairo.

It came after the Iranian Parliament unanimously passed legislation requiring the administration to suspend all cooperation with the IAEA following the Israeli-US aggression, which targeted three of the country’s nuclear sites in a clear violation of international law and the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).

In August, the European signatories to the 2015 nuclear deal, namely Britain, France, and Germany, initiated a 30-day process to activate the so-called snapback mechanism in order to restore all UN Security Council sanctions against Iran. The countdown for re-imposing sanctions is set to expire by the end of September.

Iran has rejected the move as illegitimate, citing the US unilateral withdrawal from the deal – formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) and the European trio’s decision to align with unlawful sanctions rather than fulfilling their obligations.

In the wide-ranging conversation with FRONTLINE in Tehran, Larijani said, “We have pursued every option and mechanism available for solving this conflict in a peaceful way.”

Larijani said he did not have “any specific information to share” about the extent of the damage to Iran’s nuclear sites hit by the American bombing or how much the strikes had set back Iran’s nuclear program.

The Iranian official, however, said, “In my opinion, Iran’s nuclear program can never be destroyed. Because once you have discovered a technology, they can’t take the discovery away. It’s as if you are the inventor of a certain machine, and the machine is stolen from you. You can still make it again.”

He also warned President Donald Trump of the United States that Iran will never surrender in case of new attacks.

Asked to comment about whether the US-Israeli strikes had disrupted the nuclear activity and if there was anything he could say about an underground site south of Natanz, known as Pickaxe Mountain, Iran’s security chief replied: “No, nothing. We haven’t abandoned any of those locations. But in the future they could possibly continue to run as they currently do or be shut down.”

Larijani said Iran expects the Americans to understand that the Islamic Republic is deserving of the same human rights which they proclaim for themselves and that should act with justice and morals in dealing with Iran’s nuclear program.

He cautioned that the US behavior will cause the world to descend into chaos, with the negative consequences that follow.

“The American people did not wish to elect people who will send their soldiers to the grave. They should act properly, and desire for others what they want for themselves.”

President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Thursday declaring that his plan to sell Chinese-owned TikTok’s US operations to US and global investors will address the national security requirements in a 2024 law.

The new US company will be valued at around $14 billion, Vice President JD Vance said, putting a price tag on the popular short video app far below some analyst estimates.

Trump on Thursday delayed until January 20 enforcement of the law that bans the app unless its Chinese owners sell it amid efforts to extract TikTok’s US assets from the global platform, line up American and other investors, and win approval from the Chinese government.

The publication of the executive order shows Trump is making progress on the sale of TikTok’s US assets, but numerous details need to be fleshed out, including how the US entity will use TikTok’s most important asset, its recommendation algorithm.

“There was some resistance on the Chinese side, but the fundamental thing that we wanted to accomplish is that we wanted to keep TikTok operating, but we also wanted to make sure that we protected Americans’ data privacy as required by law,” Vance told reporters at an Oval Office briefing.

Trump’s order says the algorithm will be retrained and monitored by the US company’s security partners, and operation of the algorithm will be under the control of the new joint venture.

Trump said Chinese President Xi Jinping has indicated approval of the plans. “I spoke with President Xi,” Trump said. “We had a good talk, I told him what we were doing, and he said go ahead with it.”

The Chinese embassy in Washington did not immediately respond to a request for comment. TikTok did not immediately comment on Trump’s action.

Trump has credited TikTok, which has 170 million US users, with helping him win reelection last year. Trump has 15 million followers on his personal TikTok account. The White House also launched an official TikTok account last month.

“This is going to be American-operated all the way,” Trump said.

He said that Michael Dell, the founder, chairman and CEO of Dell Technologies; Rupert Murdoch, the chairman emeritus of Fox News owner Fox Corp and newspaper publisher News Corp, and “probably four or five absolutely world-class investors” would be part of the deal.

The White House did not discuss how it came up with the $14 billion valuation.

TikTok’s Chinese parent, ByteDance, currently values itself at more than $330 billion, according to its new employee share buyback plan. TikTok contributes a small percentage of the company’s total revenue.

According to Wedbush Securities analyst Dan Ives, TikTok was estimated to be worth $30 billion to $40 billion without the algorithm as of April 2025.

Alan Rozenshtein, a professor at the University of Minnesota Law School, said the executive order leaves unanswered questions, including whether ByteDance will still control the algorithm. “The problem is that the president has certified the deal, but he has not provided a lot of information on the algorithm,” he said.

Oracle, others to own TikTok in US

A group of three investors, including Oracle and private-equity firm Silver Lake, will take a roughly 50% stake in TikTok US, two sources familiar with the deal said on Thursday.

A group of existing shareholders in ByteDance will hold a roughly 30% stake, one of the sources said.

Among ByteDance’s current investors are Susquehanna International Group, General Atlantic and KKR.

Given intense investor interest in TikTok, the 50% stake may still shift, the source noted.

Oracle and Silver Lake did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

CNBC reported earlier, citing sources, that Abu Dhabi-based MGX, Oracle and Silver Lake are poised to be the main investors in TikTok US with a combined 45% ownership.

MGX did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment on the CNBC report.

Republican House of Representatives lawmakers said they want to see more details of the deal to ensure it represents a clean break with China. “As the details are finalised, we must ensure this deal protects American users from the influence and surveillance of CCP-aligned groups,” said US Representatives Brett Guthrie, Gus Bilirakis and Richard Hudson, all Republicans.

The agreement on TikTok’s US operations includes the appointment by ByteDance of one of seven board members for the new entity, with Americans holding the other six seats, a senior White House official said on Saturday.

ByteDance would hold less than 20% in TikTok US to comply with requirements set out in the 2024 law that ordered it shut down by January 2025 if its US assets were not sold by ByteDance.