Post #5606

🔤🔤🔤🔤2️⃣ The US and Iranian delegations left Pakistan soon after the talks ended. Vance said he spoke with Trump at least half a dozen times during the talks, held during a 14-day ceasefire announced by the US, Israel and Iran overnight on 7 and 8 April. “We need to see an affirmative commitment that [Iran] will not seek a nuclear weapon, and they will not seek the tools that would enable them to quickly achieve a nuclear weapon,” Vance said. “That is the core goal of the president of the United States, and that’s what we’ve tried to achieve through these negotiations.” Mohammad Ghalibaf, the speaker of the Iranian parliament, who led Tehran’s negotiators, said he and his colleagues had offered “constructive initiatives” while the US had been “unable to gain the trust of the Iranian delegation in this round of negotiations”. Iran’s semi-official Tasnim news agency said “excessive” US demands had hindered reaching an agreement, and the foreign ministry said more time was needed. “Naturally, from the beginning we should not have expected to reach an agreement in a single session,” the ministry’s spokesperson Esmail Baghaei said, according to the state broadcaster IRIB. Pakistani mediators called on the US and Iran to refrain from renewing hostilities and said they would try to arrange a fresh round of talks. “It is imperative that the parties continue to uphold their commitment to the ceasefire,” said Pakistan’s foreign minister, Ishaq Dar. Vance was accompanied by the US special envoy Steve Witkoff and Trump’s son-in-law Kushner. They met Ghalibaf and the Iranian foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, for several negotiating sessions at the Serena hotel in Islamabad, with Pakistan’s army chief, Asim Munir, also present. Iran’s delegation arrived on Friday dressed in black in mourning for the late supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and others killed in the war. They carried shoes and bags of children killed during the bombing of a school next to a military compound, the Iranian government said. A Pakistani source said the discussions, the highest-level direct contact between the US and Iran since 1979, were unpredictable in tone. “There were mood swings from the two sides, and the temperature went up and down during the meeting,” a Pakistani source said after the first round. Trump said: “The only thing left, really, is their water, which would be very devastating to hit. I would hate to do it, but it’s their water, their desalinisation plans, their electric generating plants, which are very easy to hit.” The president was asked if gas and oil prices might be lower by the US midterms in November, an indication that attacking Iran was not an economic mistake. Prices “could be the same or maybe a little bit higher,” a non-committal Trump replied. At the Vatican, Pope Leo XIV called for a ceasefire after his Sunday prayers and said he felt “closer than ever” to Lebanon’s people. #trump#iran#strait#hormuz#vance#blockading 📱American Оbserver - Stay up to date on all important events 🇺🇸