Criticising the US after the two sides failed to achieve a breakthrough in the talks in Pakistan’s capital city of Islamabad, Iranian state media said on Sunday that the negotiations failed due to the “unreasonable” demands by the Americans. It further said that the US should refrain from making “excessive demands and unlawful requests”.
“The Iranian delegation negotiated continuously and intensively for 21 hours in order to protect the national interests of the Iranian people; despite various initiatives from the Iranian delegation, the unreasonable demands of the American side prevented the progress of the negotiations. Thus the negotiations ended,” Iran’s state broadcaster Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB) said in a statement on Telegram.
Later, Iran’s foreign ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baqaei said his country has not “forgotten and will not forget the experiences of America’s breaches of promise and malicious acts”. He also said that Iran will use all of its tools to secure its national interests.
“Nothing can or should deter us from pursuing our great historical mission toward our beloved homeland and noble Iranian civilization. The Islamic Republic of Iran is determined to utilize all tools, including diplomacy, to secure national interests and protect the country’s well-being,” he said.
The statements shortly came after US Vice President JD Vance, who was leading the American delegation, announced that Washington and Tehran have failed to reach to an agreement to end the conflict in the Middle East. In an early morning media briefing, Vance said the two sides held talks for 21 hours straight but added that Iran has decided “not to accept” the US terms.
“We have been at it now for 21 hours, and we have had a number of substantive discussions. That’s the good news… The bad news is that we have not reached an agreement,” he said. “We have made very clear what our red lines are, what things we are willing to accommodate and what things we are not willing to accommodate.”ย
However, the US vice president did not elaborate on what were the main bone of contention, but noted that nuclear was one of them. He said the US needs guarantees that Iran will not build a nuclear weapon or tools to achieve them. The US was quite “flexible and accommodating”, though, Vance said.ย
The US and Iranian delegations had reached Pakistan on Saturday, four days after they announced a two-week ceasefire. The US delegation was led by Vance and also included Special Envoy Steve Witkoff and President Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner. Meanwhile, the Iranian delegation was led by Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, and also included Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi and others.
Before the talks, Iran had laid a 10-point plan for the talks, which demanded a withdrawal of US forces from West Asia, control on the Strait of Hormuz, unfreezing of Iranian assets, and a ceasefire by Israel in Lebanon.
ย