US President Trump cancels team to Pakistan as Iran FM Araghchi departs Islamabad

WASHINGTON DC/ISLAMABAD: US President Donald Trump on Saturday said he has cancelled the scheduled visit of the US delegation, led by Special Envoy Steve Witkoff and Senior Adviser and his son-in-law Jared Kushner, to Islamabad for talks with Iran for the second round of peace talks, aimed at achieving a comprehensive resolution to hostilities in West Asia.

It was shared by Fox News White House correspondent Aishah Hasnie in a post on X, where she stated that Trump cancelled the visit by the delegation from Washington due to the long-distance engagements being unnecessary and unproductive.

The development came after the Iranian delegation, led by Iran's Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, departed Islamabad on Saturday evening after a day of high-level meetings with the Pakistan leadership, leaving Pakistan's ambitious claims of brokering a US-Iran peace deal as part of the second round of negotiations in tatters.

Hasnie was on a direct phone conversation with the US President.

"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 as quoted by Fox News.

This comes moments after the Iranian delegation, led by Iran's Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, departed Islamabad on Saturday evening (local time) after a day of high-level meetings with the Pakistan leadership, leaving Pakistan's ambitious claims of brokering a US-Iran peace deal as part of the second round of negotiations in tatters.

As reported by Al Jazeera, the delegation left the Pakistani capital after delivering an "official list of demands" to Pakistani leaders for the US and Israel in order to achieve a complete solution to the conflict in West Asia.

The departure effectively signals the end of Islamabad's hopes to facilitate the much-anticipated second round of direct dialogue, as Araghchi is now set to travel to Oman and Russia.

According to a statement issued by Araghchi in Telegram, the Iranian foreign minister explained Iran's "principled positions regarding the latest developments related to the ceasefire and the complete end of the imposed war against" the Islamic Republic by US and Israeli forces to the Pakistani side.

This weekend's diplomatic theatre is rapidly mirroring the failures of the past. The first round of talks hosted in Islamabad - featuring US Vice President JD Vance and Iranian Parliamentary Speaker MB Ghalibaf - dragged on for a gruelling 21 hours without yielding a single breakthrough.

Earlier, the Iranian delegation, led by Iran's Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, departed Islamabad on Saturday evening after a day of high-level meetings with the Pakistan leadership, leaving Pakistan's ambitious claims of brokering a US-Iran peace deal as part of the second round of negotiations in tatters.

As reported by Al Jazeera, the delegation left the Pakistani capital after delivering an "official list of demands" to Pakistani leaders for the US and Israel in order to achieve a complete solution to the conflict in West Asia.

The departure effectively signals the end of Islamabad's hopes to facilitate the much-anticipated second round of direct dialogue, as Araghchi is now set to travel to Oman and Russia, bypassing any further engagement in the Pakistani capital.

In a frantic effort to project diplomatic weight, Pakistan's top civilian and military leadership converged at the house of the Pakistani Prime Minister for a meeting with the Iranian delegation that lasted approximately two hours prior to Araghchi's departure.

While the Pakistani establishment attempted to roll out the red carpet, the city of Islamabad was held hostage by a "suffocating security lockdown."

Authorities sealed major arterial roads and placed the high-security Red Zone under a "strict cordon", paralysing daily life for residents.

However, this display of force yielded no diplomatic breakthrough. The highly anticipated second round of talks between Tehran and the US delegation--led by Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner--failed to materialise as Tehran refused to even meet the American representatives on Pakistani soil.

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.

Despite hosting the Iranian FM and the US delegation simultaneously earlier, Islamabad was unable to bring the two sides into the same room again for the second time.

Tehran's decision to deliver demands and immediately depart for Oman and Russia underscores that it views those nations, rather than Pakistan, as the credible arbiters of regional peace. (Agencies)

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