Trump cancels US envoys’ trip after Iran’s Araghchi leaves Pakistan

United States President Donald Trump has announced that his envoys would not be travelling to Pakistan for talks with Iranian officials after Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi left the country.

The US president told news outlet Fox News that he had ordered Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner to ditch plans to visit the Pakistani capital, Islamabad, for the possible talks, despite his earlier claims that Iran was “making an offer” aimed at resolving the two-month conflict.

“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.

In any case, Araghchi had already departed Islamabad, the first destination of a three-leg tour including Oman and Russia. Iran’s state-run Press TV confirmed he left on Saturday after meeting Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, Army chief Field Marshal Asim Munir and Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar.

Posting on X, Araghchi said he had shared “Iran’s position concerning workable framework to permanently end the war on Iran” with Pakistani officials. “Have yet to see if the U.S. is truly serious about diplomacy,” he added.

Later, Trump appeared to say on social media that any future talks would be taking place over the phone. “If they want to talk, all they have to do is call!!!” he wrote, adding that nobody knew who was in charge in Iran and that there was “tremendous infighting and confusion within their ‘leadership’”.

Reporting from Washington, Al Jazeera’s Rosiland Jordan said Trump’s comments suggested that the US did not see “any yielding on the Iranians part”.

She said that his talk of holding “all the cards” appeared to allude to “the US naval blockade, as well as the ongoing presence of more than 50,000 troops in the region, ready to resume combat operations”.

The pressure to strike a deal to permanently end the war has mounted amid an ongoing standoff in the Strait of Hormuz, through which approximately one-fifth of global oil and liquefied natural gas shipments transit.

Iran’s powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said Saturday that they had no intention of ending their effective blocking of the waterway, which has thrown energy markets into turmoil, according to the news agency AFP.

Asked by US media outlet Axios whether the cancelled trip by his envoys meant a resumption of hostilities, Trump said: “No. It doesn’t mean that. We haven’t thought about it yet.”

Iran’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said Araghchi had arrived in Muscat on Saturday for meetings with Omani officials. He is also expected to travel on to Russia to discuss efforts to end the war, which the United States and Israel began against Iran on February 28.