U.S., Iran Teams in Pakistan for Peace Talks Amid Doubts Over Lebanon, Sanctions

Reuters

A man rides his motorbike past a billboard installed alongside a road as Pakistan prepares to host the U.S. and Iran for peace talks, in Islamabad, Pakistan, 10 April 2026.

Senior United States and Iranian officials were in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad, on Saturday for negotiations aimed at ending their six-week conflict. However, Tehran cast doubt over the talks, stating that they could not proceed without prior commitments regarding Lebanon and the lifting of sanctions.

The U.S. delegation, led by Vice-President JD Vance and including President Donald Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff and his son-in-law Jared Kushner, arrived aboard two US Air Force aircraft at an airbase in Islamabad on Saturday morning, according to Pakistani sources.

The Iranian delegation, led by parliamentary Speaker Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf and Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi, arrived a day earlier, on Friday.

These discussions are expected to be the highest-level talks between the United States and Iran since the Islamic Revolution of 1979, and the first official face-to-face negotiations between the two countries since 2015, when an agreement was reached over Iran’s nuclear programme.

President Trump withdrew from that nuclear accord in 2018 during his first term in office. In the same year, Iran’s then Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei — who was killed at the outset of the conflict six weeks ago — prohibited further direct negotiations between US and Iranian officials.

Qalibaf said on X that Washington had previously agreed to unblock Iranian assets and to a ceasefire in Lebanon, where Israeli attacks on Iran-backed Hezbollah militants have killed nearly 2,000 people since the start of the fighting in March. He said talks would not start until those pledges were fulfilled.

Israel and the U.S. have said the Lebanon campaign is not part of the Iran-U.S. ceasefire while Tehran insists it is.

Qalibaf said separately that Iran was ready to reach a ⁠deal if Washington offered what he described as a genuine agreement and granted Iran its rights, Iranian state media reported.

The White House did not immediately comment on the Iranian demands, but President Trump posted on social media that the only reason the Iranians were alive was to negotiate a deal.

"The Iranians don't seem to realize they have no cards, other than a short term extortion of the World by using International Waterways. The only reason they are alive today is to negotiate!" he said.

Vance, speaking as he headed to Pakistan, said he expected a positive outcome but added: "If they're going to try to play us, then they're going to find the negotiating team is not that receptive."

Preliminary discussions have been separately held by Pakistani officials with advance teams from both sides, sources in Islamabad said.

Iran's semi-official Tasnim news agency said these included 70 members from Tehran, including technical specialists in economic, security and political fields as well as media personnel and support staff. About 100 members of an advance U.S. team were in the city, a Pakistani government source said.

"We're very positive," said another Pakistani source close to the discussions.

Asked if talks would end on Saturday, the source said: "Too early to say. They have instructions to close a deal or walk away. Hence not in a rush. These talks are not on the clock."

Islamabad was placed under an unprecedented security lockdown ahead of the talks, with thousands of paramilitary personnel and army troops deployed across the city.

The US President announced a two-week ceasefire in the conflict on Tuesday, bringing a halt to US and Israeli air strikes on Iran.

However, the ceasefire has neither ended Iran’s blockade of the Strait of Hormuz — which has caused the most severe disruption to global energy supplies on record — nor eased the parallel conflict between Israel and the Iran-backed Hezbollah movement in Lebanon.

The Israeli ambassador to the United States, Yechiel Leiter, and his Lebanese counterpart, Nada Hamadeh Moawad, are due to hold talks in Washington on Tuesday, according to Israeli and Lebanese officials, although there are conflicting accounts regarding the scope of those discussions.

Lebanon’s presidency said the two had spoken by telephone on Friday and agreed to discuss the announcement of a ceasefire, as well as setting a timetable for bilateral talks under US mediation. However, Israel’s embassy in Washington stated that the meeting would mark the beginning of “formal peace negotiations”, adding that Israel had declined to discuss a ceasefire with Hezbollah.

Israeli strikes continued across southern Lebanon on Friday. One attack on a government building in the city of Nabatieh killed 13 members of Lebanon’s state security forces, President Joseph Aoun said in a statement. Hezbollah said via its Telegram channel that it had launched rocket salvos at towns in northern Israel in response.

Tehran’s agenda for the Islamabad talks also includes demands for significant new concessions, including the lifting of sanctions that have severely constrained its economy, as well as recognition of its authority over the Strait of Hormuz. Iran has indicated its intention to impose transit fees and exert control over access to the waterway — a move that would represent a substantial shift in the regional balance of power.

Iran's ships were sailing through the strait ⁠unimpeded on Friday, while those of other countries remained hemmed inside.

Disruption to energy supplies has fed inflation and slowed the global economy, with an impact expected to last for months even if negotiators succeed in reopening the strait.

The hard line taken by Iran's leaders ahead of the negotiations followed a defiant message from its new Supreme Leader Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei on Thursday.

Khamenei, yet to be seen in public since taking over from his father, said Iran would demand compensation for all wartime damage. 

Source: Reuters



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