ISLAMABAD, PAKISTAN – APRIL 11: U.S. Vice President JD Vance (center) walks with Chief of Pakistan Defense Forces and Chief of Army Staff Field Marshal Asim Munir (left) and Pakistan’s Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Mohammad Ishaq Dar after arriving for talks with Iranian officials April 11, 2026 in Islamabad, Pakistan. (Photo by Jacquelyn Martin – Piscine/Getty Images)
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vice-president J.D. Vance Pakistan said Sunday morning that U.S. officials were leaving peace talks after the Iranian delegation refused to agree not to develop nuclear weapons.
“We have been working on this for 21 hours and we have had a number of substantive discussions with the Iranians. This is good news,” he said at a press conference after the talks. “The bad news is that we haven’t reached an agreement.”
The main sticking point, according to Vance, concerns Iran’s reluctance to abandon its quest for nuclear weapons.
“We need a firm commitment that they will not seek nuclear weapons, and they will not seek the tools that would allow them to quickly achieve a nuclear weapon,” he said, emphasizing that this is the president’s “primary objective.” Donald Trump hoped to achieve results in the negotiations. “They chose not to accept our terms.”
The vice president said he spoke with Trump “a half-dozen times, a dozen times, in the last 21 hours,” as well as the secretary of state. Marco RubioTreasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Admiral Brad Cooper, head of US Central Command.
“We were in constant communication with the team because we were negotiating in good faith,” Vance said, speaking at a podium alongside special envoy Steve Witkoff and Trump’s son-in-law. Jared Kushner.
“We leave here with a very simple proposal, a method of understanding which is our last and best offer. We will see if the Iranians accept it,” he said. Soon after, the vice president waved goodbye to him from the top of the stairs as he boarded Air Force Two in Islamabad.
Various Iranian state media outlets have cited sharp differences in the negotiations, including over the withdrawal of nuclear materials from the country and the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz. Iran’s Tasnim news agency said “excessive” US demands had hampered efforts to reach a deal.
Historic talks ended days after fragile two-week negotiations ceasefire was announced. Vance’s comments did not indicate what would happen after that period expires or whether the ceasefire would remain in effect.
The Iranian delegation, led by Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf, discussed with its U.S. and Pakistani counterparts how to advance the ceasefire already threatened by deep disagreements and Israel’s continued attacks on Iran-backed Hezbollah in Lebanon, whose death toll the Health Ministry said has exceeded 2,000.
The Iranian delegation arrived dressed in black in tribute to the late Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and others killed during the war. They were carrying shoes and bags of some students killed in the U.S. bombing of a school next to a military compound, the Iranian government said. The Pentagon said the strike was under investigation.
“There were mood swings on both sides and the temperature rose and fell during the meeting,” a Pakistani source told Reuters, referring to the first round of talks.
For the US-Iran talks, Islamabad, a city of more than 2 million people, was locked down with thousands of paramilitaries and soldiers on the streets.
US destroyers pass through the Strait of HormuzThe peace talks took place as two US warships passed through the Strait of Hormuz for the first time since the conflict began. U.S. Central Command said the warships were taking part in a mission to clear waterways of sea mines planted by Iran.
The ceasefire between the United States and Iran, which began Tuesday, is under strain as Iran continues to block most maritime traffic passing through the strait, the world’s most critical chokepoint for oil and gas supplies.
U.S. Central Command said forces had begun setting up conditions for mine clearance in the strait, as two U.S. Navy guided-missile destroyers conducted operations. The USS Frank E. Peterson and the USS Michael Murphy transited the strait and operated in the Persian Gulf as part of a broader mission to clear sea mines previously laid by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said in a statement. post on.
“Today we began the process of establishing a new passage and we will soon share this safe route with the maritime industry to encourage the free flow of commerce,” Adm. Brad Cooper, commander of CENTCOM, said in a statement.
“We are sweeping the strait. Whether we make a deal or not makes no difference to me,” the US president said Donald Trump ” told reporters as the high-stakes talks continued into the night and it approached 2 a.m. in Pakistan.
However, Iranian state media earlier said Iran had forced a U.S. military ship trying to cross the strait to turn around. MS Now later reported that commercial maritime traffic systems showing the USS Michael Murphy passing through the Strait of Hormuz into the Persian Gulf were unreliable.
On Saturday evening, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps warned that any attempt by military vessels to transit the Strait of Hormuz would be met with “a strong response.” Only non-military vessels would be allowed to pass under specific regulations, the IRGC said in a statement carried by Iranian media.
Separately, a senior Iranian source told Reuters the United States had agreed to release frozen assets held in Qatar and other foreign banks, but a U.S. official immediately denied the report.
Oil tankers leave the Gulf through the straitThree supertankers passed through the Strait of Hormuz on Saturday, according to shipping data, marking what appears to be the first vessels to leave the Gulf since the ceasefire agreement between the United States and Iran.
Tehran’s blockade of the strait, a chokepoint for about 20% of global oil and liquefied natural gas shipments, since Iran’s war began in late February, has disrupted global energy supplies and sent oil prices soaring.
The Liberian-flagged Very Large Crude Carrier (VLCC) Serifos and the Chinese-flagged VLCCs Cospearl Lake and He Rong Hai entered and exited the “Hormuz Passage test anchorage” that bypasses Iran’s Larak Island on Saturday, according to LSEG data.
Each ship is capable of carrying 2 million barrels of oil.
Serifos, carrying crude loaded from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates in early March, is expected to arrive at Malaysia’s Malacca port on April 21, according to data from LSEG and analytics firm Kpler.
Lake Cospearl is loaded with Iraqi oil and He Rong Hai carries Saudi crude, according to the same data.
The two VLCCs are chartered by Unipec, the trading arm of Chinese energy giant Sinopec, according to the data.
Trump’s frustration with IranTrump expressed frustration that Iran continues to block most maritime traffic through the Strait of Hormuz.
In a announcement On Tuesday evening, Trump said the United States would agree to a two-week suspension of hostilities subject to Iran agreeing to a full and immediate reopening of the Strait of Hormuz.
But since then, maritime traffic across the strait remains almost as limited as it has been since the war began on February 28.
In a society of truth job On Thursday evening, Trump fumed: “There are reports that Iran is charging fees to oil tankers passing through the Strait of Hormuz. They better not do it, and if they do, they better stop now!
Iran is “doing a very poor, some would say dishonorable, job of allowing oil to pass through the Strait of Hormuz,” the president wrote in a subsequent message. “That’s not the deal we have!”
Israel and Lebanon will hold direct negotiationsNegotiations between Israel and Lebanon are expected to begin Tuesday in Washington, Lebanese President Joseph Aoun’s office said Friday, following Israel’s surprise announcement authorizing talks despite the lack of official relations between the two countries.
But thousands of people in Lebanon protested the planned negotiations, and Prime Minister Nawaf Salam said he had postponed a planned trip to Washington “in light of current internal circumstances.” What that meant for the negotiations was not immediately clear.
Read more about CNBC’s politics coverageIsrael wants the Lebanese government to take responsibility for disarming Hezbollah, as was envisaged during the November 2024 ceasefire. But it is unclear whether the Lebanese army can confiscate weapons from the militant group, which has survived efforts to reduce its forces for decades.
Israel’s insistence that Iran’s ceasefire does not include a pause in its fighting with Hezbollah has threatened to derail the deal. The militant group joined the war in support of Iran from the earliest days. Israel followed up with airstrikes and a ground invasion.
The day the ceasefire deal with Iran was announced, Israel bombarded Beirut with airstrikes, killing more than 300 people, marking the deadliest day in Lebanon since the start of the war, according to the country’s Health Ministry.
Qatar to fully resume maritime navigation activitiesQatar’s Ministry of Transport announced the full resumption of maritime shipping activities starting Sunday from 6:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. local time, extending the decision to “all categories of vessels and modes of transport.”
The ministry urged operators in a statement to comply with safety protocols.
It was not immediately clear whether the move meant Qatari ships would be allowed to transit the Strait of Hormuz, which remains effectively closed.
Pope Leo denounces “illusion of omnipotence” fueling warIn his strongest words, Pope Leo XIV denounced “the illusion of omnipotence ance” that is fueling the U.S.-Israel war in Iran and has demanded that political leaders stop and negotiate peace.
Leo presided over an evening prayer ceremony in St. Peter’s Basilica on the same day that the United States and Iran began face-to-face negotiations in Pakistan and a fragile ceasefire was held.
The first American-born pope did not mention the United States or Trump in his prayer, planned before the talks were announced. But Leo’s tone and message appear to be aimed at Trump and U.S. officials, who boast of American military superiority and justify the war in religious terms.
“Enough of the idolatry of self and money!” Leo said. “Enough show of power! Enough war!”
On the benches of the basilica was the Archbishop of Tehran, the Belgian Cardinal Dominique Joseph Mathieu. The United States was represented in the diplomatic corps by its deputy head of mission, Laura Hochla, the American embassy said.
—Reuters and Associated Press contributed to this report
