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Ceasefire talks between the United States and Iran appeared to falter even before they began Saturday, after Iran’s foreign minister left Pakistan and U.S. President Donald Trump said he had told his envoys not to travel to Islamabad. The episode came as the two sides tried to build on earlier face-to-face talks, but Iranian officials raised questions about trust amid a U.S. naval blockade of Iranian ports and ongoing pressure near the Strait of Hormuz.
Trump said on social media that he had canceled the trip and told envoys not to go to Pakistan, while also saying “Too much time wasted on traveling, too much work!” The White House had said Friday that Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner would travel to Islamabad for the new round of talks.
Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi left Islamabad Saturday evening, according to two Pakistani officials who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media. Araghchi later posted that he had shared Iran’s position on a “workable framework” to end the war but said Iran had “yet to see if the U.S. is truly serious about diplomacy,” reflecting skepticism about what the U.S. was prepared to accept.
Earlier in Pakistan, Araghchi met with Army Chief Field Marshal Asim Munir and Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif about what he called Iran’s red lines for negotiations. The Iranian foreign minister then went on to Oman, a mediator in the talks before the war, and the state-run IRNA news agency reported he would return to Pakistan on Sunday before visiting Russia.
A separate ceasefire between Israel and the Iranian-backed Hezbollah also showed fragility on Saturday. The sides fired at each other, and Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered the military to “vigorously attack Hezbollah targets in Lebanon,” as the talks in Islamabad were unfolding.
The wider war has remained centered on maritime and regional pressure around the Strait of Hormuz, through which about a fifth of the world’s oil passes in peacetime. Iran’s grip on the strait has contributed to higher oil prices since the war began, while the U.S. has maintained a blockade on Iranian ports. Trump has also ordered the military to “shoot and kill” small boats that could be laying mines, and Germany’s Defense Minister Boris Pistorius said Germany was sending minesweeper ships to the Mediterranean to help remove Iranian mines from the strait once hostilities end.
Beyond the immediate diplomacy, Iran resumed commercial flights from Tehran’s international airport on Saturday for the first time since the war began, following U.S. and Israeli strikes on Feb. 28, according to state-run television. Flights were scheduled to depart for Istanbul, Oman’s capital of Muscat, and the Saudi city of Medina.
Even as the U.S. and Iran discussed ceasefire steps, the conflict’s toll continued to mount, according to authorities. Since the war began, at least 3,375 people had been killed in Iran and at least 2,496 in Lebanon, where Israel and Hezbollah’s new round of fighting broke out two days after the Iran war started. Trump announced Thursday that Israel and Lebanon had agreed to extend a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah by three weeks, though Hezbollah had not participated in the U.S.-brokered diplomacy.
On Saturday, Israel struck southern Lebanon, killing at least six people, and rockets and drones were launched at Israel from Lebanon. The report also said 23 people had been killed in Israel and more than a dozen in Gulf Arab states, adding that 15 Israeli soldiers in Lebanon, 13 U.S. service members in the region, and six members of the U.N. peacekeeping force in southern Lebanon had been killed.
The negotiations’ key sticking points remained Iran’s enriched uranium and the standoff around the Strait of Hormuz, alongside concerns about Iran’s missile program and its support for armed proxies in the region. Iran has said indirect talks over its nuclear program earlier this year ended with Iran being attacked by the U.S. and Israel, adding to Tehran’s wariness about another diplomacy effort.