Obama writes rare letter to Iran's Supreme Leader

In a rare outreach to Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, President Barack Obama has written a letter about the fight against Islamic State militants, a common enemy in Syria and Iraq, The Associated Press reported, citing diplomatic sources.

Obama's letter to Iran's powerful religious leader comes against the backdrop of the looming Nov. 24 deadline in nuclear negotiations between the U.S. and Iran, as well as five other world powers. While Obama has previously sent letters to Khamenei, any communication between the two men has been extremely rare.

The Wall Street Journal, which first reported that Obama had sent the letter, said it described a shared interest between the U.S. and Iran in fighting Islamic State militants and stressed that any cooperation on that would be largely contingent on Iran agreeing to the nuclear deal. However, while not confirming nor denying the existence of the letter, administration officials said there were still no plans to cooperate or coordinate with Iran against the militants.

"The United States will not cooperate militarily with Iran in that effort," White House spokesman Josh Earnest said. "We won't share intelligence with them."

Diplomatic sources separately confirmed the existence of the letter to The Associated Press. They did so on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to publicly discuss Obama's outreach.