Ali Larijani, secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, has arrived in Oman in the wake of talks held in the country between Tehran and Washington over the former’s nuclear programme, Iranian state media reported.

Larijani, a close adviser to Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, is due to meet Omani Foreign Minister Badr al-Busaidi, the chief intermediary in the talks, as well as Oman’s Sultan Haitham bin Tariq Al Said, the state-run IRNA news agency reported on Tuesday.

The agency said “discussions over the latest regional and international developments” were on the agenda for Larijani’s visit to Muscat, “as well as ways to strengthen bilateral cooperation between Iran and Oman”.

Reporting from Tehran, Al Jazeera’s Tohid Asadi said some analysts were interpreting the visit, on the back of the recent talks in the country, “as a positive sign indicating a sort of progress” in efforts to advance the negotiations.

Oman hosted talks on Iran’s nuclear programme last week aimed at avoiding a conflict between Tehran and Washington, amid surging tensions and a growing United States military build-up in the region.

It was an outcome of concerted diplomatic efforts in the region to avert a conflict. A second round of talks has been confirmed, but a date has not been announced.

IRNA reported on Tuesday that Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi had held a series of phone calls with his counterparts in Turkiye, Egypt and Saudi Arabia to brief them on the latest developments in the indirect negotiations with Washington in Muscat.

At a news briefing on Tuesday, Esmaeil Baghaei, spokesperson for Iran’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said Larijani’s visit was part of regional consultations in line with Tehran’s policy of strengthening relations with neighbouring countries, and had been planned in advance.

Regarding the negotiations with the US, Baghaei said Washington “must act independently, free from the destructive pressures being exerted that harm the region and American interests”.

He urged the US to resist Israeli pressure over the nuclear issue, claiming that “one of the United States’ problems in the region is its subservience to the demands of the Zionist entity, which is the primary factor destabilising security in the region.

“Israel has turned our nuclear programme into an artificial crisis and is trying to raise unfounded fears about a nuclear bomb that does not exist in Iran,” he said.

Baghaei added that the latest nuclear talks had been to gauge the “seriousness” of the other side, adding that Iran was “committed to diplomacy to secure the interests of our people, taking into account past negative experiences”.

He said Larijani would visit Qatar after his trip to Oman.

Both sides have given mixed signals about their progress in the negotiations.

However, on Monday, Iran’s atomic energy chief Mohammad Eslami said Tehran was open to diluting its highly enriched uranium if the US ends sanctions, signalling flexibility on a key US demand.

Eslami said the prospects of Iran diluting its 60 percent enriched uranium, a threshold close to weapons-grade, would hinge on “whether all sanctions would be lifted in return”, IRNA reported.

US President Donald Trump has repeatedly called for Iran to be subject to a total ban on enrichment, a condition unacceptable to Tehran.

Washington has demanded Iran relinquish its stockpile – estimated last year by the United Nations nuclear agency at more than 440kg (970lb) – of uranium enriched to up to 60 percent fissile purity, a small step away from the 90 percent ⁠that is considered weapons-grade.

Araghchi, speaking to diplomats at a summit in Tehran on Sunday, had signalled that Iran would stick to its position that it must be allowed to enrich uranium.

“The Americans are now saying that they are looking for a package of comprehensive negotiations to include other controversial issues such as the ballistic missiles, defence capabilities, regional activities of the country,” said Al Jazeera’s Asadi.

“Meanwhile ,Tehran is saying it wants talks to be focused and concentrated around the nuclear policy, and for the knots to be untangled one by one.”

The date of the next round of talks has yet to be announced, although Trump has said they will be held this week.

Iran and the US held five rounds of talks last year on curbing Tehran’s nuclear programme, with the process stalling largely owing to disputes over uranium enrichment.

Washington then joined Israeli strikes on Iran in June, targeting the Natanz, Fordow and Isfahan nuclear facilities with bunker-buster hits.

Since those strikes, Tehran has said it has halted enrichment activity.

It has always maintained that its nuclear programme is solely for peaceful purposes.

Larijani’s Oman trip comes as Benjamin Netanyahu is due to head to the US on Tuesday for a meeting with Trump to discuss Washington’s ongoing negotiations with Iran, the Israeli prime minister’s Office said on Monday.

The planned meeting will be the seventh between Trump and Netanyahu since the US president returned to office last year.

Analysts have said Netanyahu will likely urge Trump to push Tehran on its ballistic missile programme, seen as a red line by Tehran.

The US has sought to include Iran’s ballistic missile arsenal in negotiations, but Tehran has ruled this out, with Araghchi insisting its missile programme is “non-negotiable”.