Washington and Tehran are weighing a new round of in-person negotiations that could take place as early as Thursday this week, with Islamabad and Geneva emerging as the two possible venues being discussed, as both sides race against an April 21 ceasefire expiry deadline that is now just eight days away, the Associated Press reported citing sources familiar with the discussions.
Three sources told the American agency that discussions were still underway about a new round of talks, while a diplomat from one of the mediating countries went further to confirm that Tehran and Washington have agreed in principle to meet again. A US official said venue and timing had not been decided but that Thursday was being discussed as a possible date. It remains unclear whether the same level of delegation would attend the new round as was present in Islamabad.
The development marks a significant shift in the diplomatic temperature from earlier on Monday, when Iran was declaring a permanent Hormuz control mechanism, threatening Gulf ports, calling US restrictions piracy, and watching Brent crude spike 8.79% above $102 per barrel. By Monday evening the picture had changed — Trump told reporters that “we’ve been called by the other side” and “they want to work a deal,” while Iran’s envoy confirmed Tehran was willing to continue discussions with the US.
What JD Vance said about Islamabad
US Vice President JD Vance, who led the American delegation in Islamabad alongside Special Envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, gave the most substantive public assessment of what happened in Pakistan from the American side. Speaking to Fox News, Vance pushed back against characterisations of the talks as a straightforward failure. “I wouldn’t just say that things went wrong. I also think things went right. We made a lot of progress,” Vance said. “They moved in our direction, which is why I think we would say that we had some good signs, but they didn’t move far enough.”
The framing is important. Vance is not describing a collapsed negotiation — he is describing a negotiation that made progress but fell short of completion. That is a different diplomatic posture than the one Iran was publicly projecting on Monday with its permanent Hormuz mechanism declaration and Gulf port threats. The gap between Vance’s “they moved in our direction” and Iran’s simultaneous maximalist public statements is the space in which Thursday’s potential talks would need to operate.
What broke down in Islamabad and what remains unresolved
The United States and Iran ended 21 hours of face-to-face talks in Islamabad on Sunday without reaching a deal, leaving the ceasefire’s fate unclear. The US delegation was led by Vance and the Iranian delegation was led by parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf — a senior enough representation from both sides to signal genuine intent when the talks began. Among the issues at stake were the Strait of Hormuz, which Iran has effectively blocked and the US has vowed to reopen, Iran’s nuclear programme and the question of uranium enrichment that Netanyahu confirmed Vance told him is a fundamental non-negotiable, and international sanctions on Tehran.
A Pakistani government source told Reuters that there was strong hope in the middle of the Islamabad talks that a breakthrough was imminent and an agreement within reach — but that things changed very quickly. The description of a near-agreement that collapsed at the last moment is consistent with the diplomatic pattern of the entire conflict — multiple moments where resolution appeared close before fundamental disagreements reasserted themselves.
The April 21 deadline
The ceasefire announced on April 8 was described by Trump as a total and complete victory and runs for two weeks, expiring on April 21. That deadline is now the organising pressure point for the entire diplomatic effort. If Thursday’s talks produce a framework agreement, there are eight days to finalise and implement it before the ceasefire expires. If Thursday’s talks fail again, there are three days between a second failure and a deadline that could see military operations resume in a conflict that has already cost Iran 3,000 lives, closed the world’s most important energy waterway, driven Brent crude above $102, and contributed to the worst Indian equity market performance since March 2020.
Pakistan, Egypt, and Turkey confirmed they would continue mediation efforts in the coming days. The regional source who told Axios “the door is not closed, it’s a bazaar” was describing exactly the environment in which Thursday’s potential talks would take place — noisy, chaotic, contested at every point, but still open.
For India, which reopens its equity markets on Wednesday morning after the Ambedkar Jayanti holiday and whose MCX crude evening session opens at 5 pm Tuesday, the news that US-Iran talks may resume Thursday is the most market-relevant development since Brent crossed $100 on Monday. A credible diplomatic track reduces the probability of a worst-case blockade scenario. A resumed negotiation — even an inconclusive one — is better for Indian energy security than no negotiation at all.
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