FILE – In this Feb. 3, 2012, file photo, released by an official website of the Iranian supreme leader’s office, Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei waves to the worshippers before he delivers his Friday prayers sermon, at the Tehran University campus, Iran. The U.S. and Iran secretly engaged in high-level, face-to-face talks, at least three times over the past year, in a high stakes diplomatic gamble by the administration that paved the way for the historic deal aimed at slowing Iran’s nuclear program. At President Barack Obama’s direction, the U.S. began a tentative outreach to Iran shortly after his January 2009 inauguration. Obama and Khamenei exchanged letters but that first engagement yielded no results. (AP Photo/Office of the Supreme Leader, File)