US President Donald Trump on Thursday doubled down on his claim that he is in talks with Iran to end the nearly month-long war, even as Tehran flatly denied any negotiations were underway.

Speaking at a Republican fundraiser, Trump went further, making the extraordinary assertion that Iran’s leadership had informally floated the idea of him becoming the Islamic Republic’s next Supreme Leader, but he turned them down.

“There’s never been a head of a country that wanted that job less than being the head of Iran,” Trump said at the annual NRCC dinner. “We hear them very clearly. They say, I don’t want it. We’d like to make you the next supreme leader. No, thank you. I don’t want it.”

The remarks come amid what’s effectively a power vacuum in Iran after many of its top leaders were killed in strikes. Following the assassination of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei last month, his son, Mojtaba Khamenei, was subsequently elevated as supreme leader. However, he has not appeared in public since the war broke out. Reports have suggested he was injured in the attacks.

Trump described the operation against Iran as a “military decimation”, and once again gleefully declared a US victory in the war. He insisted that backchannel talks with Tehran were progressing, and that the regime was eager for a ceasefire but was balking due to fear of repercussions at home.

“And I tell you, we’re winning so big, nobody’s ever seen anything like we’re doing in the Middle East with Iran. And they are negotiating, by the way, and they want to make a deal so badly. But they’re afraid to say it because they figure they’ll be killed by their own people. They’re also afraid they’ll be killed by us,” he said.

CEASEFIRE PROPOSAL AND PUSHBACK

As the Middle East war continued to roil global energy markets and regional stability, Washington reportedly sent Tehran a 15-point ceasefire proposal through intermediaries, including Pakistan.

According to US media reports, the plan calls for dismantling Iran’s nuclear programme, ending support for proxy groups such as Lebanon’s Hezbollah, and reopening the Strait of Hormuz.

Tehran has publicly shot down both the proposal and claims of talks.

“Has the level of your inner struggle reached the stage of you (Trump) negotiating with yourself?” said Iran’s joint military command spokesperson Ebrahim Zolfaqari on state television.

“As we have always said… no one like us will make a deal with you. Not now. Not ever.”

Iran’s semi-official Fars News Agency reported that Tehran has instead put forward a five-point counter-proposal, making it clear that any end to the conflict would be dictated on its own terms.