'Not Making 18 Hour Flight': Trump Unilaterally Cancels Delegation-Level Talks In Islamabad
"I've told my people a little while ago they were getting ready to leave, and I said, 'Nope, you're not making an 18 hour flight to go there. We have all the cards. They can call us anytime they want, but you're not going to be making any more 18 hour flights to sit around talking about nothing’," Trump said.
Washington: In a significant blow to the delegation-level peace talks between US and Iran in Pakistan, president Donald Trump said that he has unilaterally cancelled a planned trip by Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner to Islamabad.
"I've told my people a little while ago they were getting ready to leave, and I said, 'Nope, you're not making an 18 hour flight to go there. We have all the cards. They can call us anytime they want, but you're not going to be making any more 18 hour flights to sit around talking about nothing’," Trump was quoted as saying to Fox News.
Araghchi Departs From Islamabad
The Iranian delegation, led by Iran's Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, which was in Islamabad for the peace talks, departed the Pakistani capital on Saturday evening after a long day of high-level meetings. Tehran delivered an "official list of demands" to Pakistani leaders directed at US and Israel to achieve a solution to the war in West Asia.
Pakistan's top civilian and military leadership met at the residence of the Pakistani Prime Minister for a meeting with the Iranian delegation that lasted approximately two hours.
Tehran was "not ready to meet the US delegation", which includes US Special Envoy Steve Witkoff and Senior Adviser and son-in-law of US President Donald Trump, Jared Kushner, who were earlier scheduled to travel to Islamabad for these talks.
Tehran's decision to deliver demands and immediately depart for Oman and Russia singals that it considers those nations as the credible arbiters of regional peace, rather than Pakistan.
Now with Trump cancelling Witkoff and Kushner's visit, Pakistan's ambitious claims of brokering a US-Iran peace deal as part of the second round of negotiations effectively lay in tatters.
Pakistan's Diplomatic Loss
The departure of the Iranian delegation and Trump's sudden decision to call off the visit, signals the end of Islamabad's hopes to facilitate the second round of dialogue between the two warring sides, that the world was keenly waiting for, given the global energy crisis it has triggered owing to the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, the world's most crucial energy pipeline.
As per reports, the Iranian side, rather than engaging in the mediated peace talks, only handed over a list of preconditions, specifically the lifting of the US naval blockade on Iranian ports on the Strait of Hormuz.
The failure to reach any deal despite two frantic attempts signals that the Pakistani establishment has been entirely sidelined by the actual stakeholders.
Taking to X, Sharif attempted to put a positive spin on the failure, stating he had a "most warm, cordial exchange of views" and discussed "further strengthening of Pakistan-Iran bilateral relations". Similarly, Ishaq Dar emphasised "the importance of dialogue and diplomacy" in a separate post on X.
The first round of talks hosted in Islamabad, which was attended by US Vice President JD Vance and Iranian Parliamentary Speaker MB Ghalibaf, had also dragged on for 21 hours without yielding any breakthrough. (With inputs from ANI)
Published By : Satyaki Baidya
Published On: 25 April 2026 at 21:43 IST