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President Donald Trump revealed to Fox News on Saturday that he unilaterally canceled U.S. negotiators Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner’s planned trip to Pakistan for talks with Iran.
The president said in an exclusive interview with Fox News’ White House correspondent Aishah Hasnie that it’s not worth the U.S. delegation making the 18-hour flight to Pakistan when the U.S. holds all the cards in the conflict with Iran.
“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.
“And I canceled the trip, and I said, anytime they want to phone us, we’re ready, willing and able, but we’re not going to waste a lot of time,” Trump told Fox News.
LIVE UPDATES: TRUMP CANCELS US TRIP TO PAKISTAN FOR IRAN NEGOTIATIONS
Then in a post on Truth Social, Trump said Iran is suffering from “tremendous infighting and confusion within their ‘leadership.’”
“Nobody knows who is in charge, including them,” Trump wrote.
U.S. special envoy Witkoff and Kushner, who is Trump’s son-in-law, were supposed to travel to Pakistan this weekend for the second round of U.S.-Iran negotiations during Operation Epic Fury.
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Prior to the cancellation, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Friday that “We’ve certainly seen some progress from the Iranian side in the last couple of days” regarding a potential deal to end the conflict.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi was in Islamabad, Pakistan, on Saturday to meet with Pakistan’s prime minister.
“Very fruitful visit to Pakistan, whose good offices and brotherly efforts to bring back peace to our region we very much value,” he said on X following the trip.
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“Shared Iran’s position concerning workable framework to permanently end the war on Iran. Have yet to see if the U.S. is truly serious about diplomacy,” he added.
Vice President JD Vance was supposed to travel to Pakistan earlier this week for a second round of talks, but he was called back to the White House for meetings, and the trip was postponed indefinitely.
Vance, Witkoff and Kushner were in Pakistan earlier this month for the first round of talks with the Iranian, but no deal was reached after their in-person meeting.