The United States and Iran will resume high-level talks in Pakistan on Sunday. This was reported by the Iranian media on Sunday night, AFP reported. Iran’s Tasnim news agency added that “the first day of Iran-US talks in Islamabad ended (on Saturday) after a 15-hour marathon.” The Mehr and Fárs agencies said the next round of negotiations would begin in the early hours of Sunday. US President Donald Trump has said he “doesn’t care” if the United States reaches a deal with Iran, saying the US is “winning anyway”.
„We are making progress in negotiations with Iran. We still win. We defeated them militarily,” Trump told reporters. “We’ll see what happens. But from my point of view, it’s irrelevant,” he added. One of the main points of contention at the talks in Islamabad is control of the Strait of Hormuz, where traffic has been severely disrupted by Iranian missile and drone attacks. In this context, Trump said that the US military deployed minesweepers in the area to search for Iranian mines.
At the same time, he again criticized NATO allies, who, according to him, did not provide support to the United States in securing the maritime route. “Now all we will do is open the strait, even if we don’t use it ourselves. It’s being used by other countries that are either afraid, weak or parsimonious,” he said. “I don’t know what it is, but NATO hasn’t helped us, I can say that.” The talks in Pakistan are taking place amid a two-week ceasefire that was declared on Tuesday.
Vice President JD Vance, Special Envoy for the Middle East Steve Witkoff and Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner are participating on the American side. The Iranian delegation is headed by the Speaker of the Parliament, Mohammad Báker Kálibaf, and its member is also the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Abbas Arákči. The negotiations have a tripartite format – they are also held with the participation of Pakistan as a mediator. The main topics are a permanent ceasefire, ensuring freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz and the fate of frozen Iranian assets.
The meeting in Islamabad marks the first direct talks at such a high level between the United States and Iran since the Islamic Revolution in 1979. Although there have been some direct contacts in the past, the summit in Pakistan is unique in its format and level of representation. Since the severance of diplomatic relations in April 1980, communication between Washington and Tehran has been carried out almost exclusively through intermediaries (Switzerland, Oman, Pakistan).
