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Neither side has indicated what will happen after the 14-day ceasefire ends on April 22.
Vice President J.D. Vance, right, speaks during a news conference after meeting with representatives from Pakistan and Iran as Jared Kushner, left, and Steve Witkoff, special envoy for peace missions, listen on Sunday, April 12, 2026, in Islamabad, Pakistan. (AP Photo/Jacqueline Martin, Pool)
ISLAMABAD (AP) — The United States and Iran ended direct talks Sunday without reaching an agreement to end the war, leaving a fragile two-week ceasefire in doubt.
American officials said that the negotiations collapsed due to what they described as Iran’s refusal to commit to abandoning its nuclear program, while Iranian officials blamed the United States for the collapse of the talks without specifying the sticking points.
Neither side has indicated what will happen after the 14-day ceasefire ends on April 22. Pakistani mediators urged all parties to preserve it. Both said their positions were clear and placed the onus on the other side, highlighting the extent to which the gap had been narrowed during the talks.
“We need to see a positive commitment that they will not seek a nuclear weapon, they will not seek the tools that will enable them to achieve a nuclear weapon quickly,” Vice President J.D. Vance said after the 21-hour talks.
Iranian Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf, who led Iran in the negotiations, said it was time for the United States “to decide whether it can earn our trust or not.”
He did not mention the underlying differences in a series of social media posts, although Iranian officials previously said the talks collapsed over two or three key issues, blaming what they described as US overreach.
Iran has It has long denied seeking nuclear weapons But it insisted on its right to have a civilian nuclear program. Experts say that its stock of enriched uranium, although not weapons-grade, is only a short technical step away.
Since the United States and Israel launched the war on February 28, it has killed at least 3,000 people in Iran, 2020 in Lebanon, 23 in Israel and more than a dozen in Gulf Arab states, and caused lasting damage to infrastructure in six Middle Eastern countries. Iran’s grip on the Strait of Hormuz has largely isolated the Persian Gulf and its oil and gas exports from the global economy. Sending energy prices soaring.
Pakistani Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar said that his country will try to facilitate a new dialogue between Iran and the United States in the coming days.
“It is essential that both parties continue to adhere to the ceasefire,” Dar said.
The impasse — and Vance’s “take it or leave it” proposal that Iran end its nuclear program — has been reversed. Nuclear talks in February in Switzerland. Although President Donald Trump said the subsequent war was aimed at forcing Iran’s leaders to abandon their nuclear ambitions, each side’s positions appeared unchanged in negotiations after six weeks of fighting.
There was no news on whether they would resume, although Iran said it was open to continuing the dialogue, the state-run Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA) reported.
“We never sought war,” said 60-year-old Mohammad Bagher Karami in downtown Tehran. “But if they try to win what they failed to win on the battlefield through talks, that is absolutely unacceptable.”
American moves to change the status quo in the Strait of Hormuz
The United States and Iran entered the talks with very different proposals and contradictory assumptions about their leverage to end the war. Before negotiations began, the ceasefire was already threatened by deep disagreements and ongoing Israeli attacks against Iran-backed Hezbollah. Lebanon.
Iran’s 10-point proposal ahead of the talks called for a guaranteed end to the war and sought control of the Strait of Hormuz. It included ending the fight against Iran’s “regional allies” and explicitly calling for an end to Israeli strikes on Hezbollah.
Pakistani officials told The Associated Press in March that the 15-point US proposal includes mechanisms to monitor and roll back Iran’s nuclear program. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss details, and said the matter also includes reopening the Strait of Hormuz.
In fact, Iran’s closure of the strait proved its greatest strategic advantage in the war. About a fifth of the world’s traded oil passes through more than 100 ships every day.
During the talks, the US military said that two destroyers crossed the vital waterway before mine clearance work, the first since the war began. But Iranian official media reported that the country’s joint military command denied this.
“We’re surveying the Strait. Whether we make a deal or not makes no difference to me,” Trump said as talks continued into early Sunday morning.
Israel is moving forward in Lebanon
The impasse raises new questions about the fighting in Lebanon. Israel went ahead with its strikes after declaring a ceasefire, saying that the agreement did not apply there. Iran and Pakistan claimed otherwise.
The Lebanese National News Agency reported that six people were killed on Sunday morning in an Israeli raid in the village of Maaroub, near the southern coastal city of Tyre. Although the Israeli raids on Beirut have calmed down in recent days, their attacks on southern Lebanon intensified in conjunction with… Ground invasion It was renewed after Hezbollah fired missiles towards Israel in the first days of the Iranian war.
Negotiations between Israel and Lebanon are expected to begin on Tuesday in Washington, Lebanese President Joseph Aoun’s office said, after Israel’s surprise announcement of allowing talks to take place despite the lack of official relations between the two countries. Protests broke out in Beirut on Saturday over the planned negotiations.
Israel wants the Lebanese government to assume responsibility for disarming Hezbollah, as envisioned in an agreement November 2024 ceasefire. But the militant group has weathered efforts to limit its power for decades.
The day the ceasefire agreement was announced with Iran, Israel Beirut was bombed with air strikesKilling more than 300 people on the bloodiest day in Lebanon since the start of the war, according to the country’s Ministry of Health.
Metz reported from Ramallah, West Bank, and Magdy reported from Cairo. Eduardo Castillo in Beijing, Colin Binkley and Ben Finley in Washington, and Karim Chehayeb in Beirut contributed.