An Iranian delegation led by Parliament Speaker Mohammed Bagher Ghalibaf has landed in Pakistani capital Islamabad for talks with the United States, CNN reported.

Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, Supreme National Security Council Secretary Ali Akbar Ahmadian and Central Bank Governor Abdolnaser Hemmati are part of the delegation, according to the country’s semi-official Fars News Agency.

A US government plane ​carrying top ‌officials from Washington, including US Vice-President JD Vance, also landed in ​Islamabad on Saturday for the talks with ⁠Iran, the BBC reported. Vance is heading his country’s delegation for the negotiations.

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This comes three days after Iran and the US arrived at a two-week ceasefire agreement, allowing for further negotiations to end the war.

Here are more top updates from the conflict in West Asia:

  • Ghalibaf on Friday said that two previously agreed measures – a ceasefire in Lebanon and the release of Iran’s blocked assets – are yet to be implemented. “These two matters must be fulfilled before negotiations begin,” he asserted in a social media post.
  • On arriving at the Islamabad airport, Ghalibaf told Iranian state media that his delegation has goodwill but does not trust its counterparts from the United States. However, he said that if the US was ready for a “genuine agreement”, Tehran could be willing as well. “Unfortunately, our experience of negotiating with the Americans has always ended in failure and violations of commitments,” he said, according to CNN.
  • US President Donald Trump said that his top priority in the peace talks would be to ensure that Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon, AFP reported. In a social media post, he said that Iran did not seem to realise that it has “no cards, other than a short term extortion of the world by using international waterways”, referring to Tehran’s blocking of the Strait of Hormuz. “The only reason they are alive today is to negotiate,” Trump remarked.
  • Israel’s Ambassador Yechiel Leiter told his counterpart from Lebanon that he “refused to discuss a ceasefire” with Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, according to AFP. He said that Israel has “agreed to begin formal peace negotiations” with the Lebanese government, with which it has no diplomatic relations, he said.
  • The Lebanese health ministry said that the toll from Israeli strikes in the country on Wednesday rose from 303 to 357, AFP reported. The overall toll in Lebanon since March 2, when the Israeli attacks on the country began amid the broader conflict in the region, has risen to 1,953, the ministry said. It noted, however, that the figure was provisional, as rubble from Israeli strikes was still being removed.
  • Liquefied petroleum gas tanker Jag Vikram crossed the Strait of Hormuz between Friday night and Saturday morning, The Indian Express reported citing ship tracking data. The tanker became the first India-flagged vessel to cross the maritime chokepoint since the announcement of the temporary two-week ceasefire between the US and Iran.
  • Indian External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said that another 312 Indian fishermen were safely evacuated from Iran to India through Armenia. “Thank the Government of Armenia and my friend [Armenian Foreign Affairs Minister] Ararat Mirzoyan for making it possible,” Jaishankar said on social media.

The war

The US and Israel launched an attack on Iran on February 28, claiming that Tehran’s action posed an existential threat to Israel. Washington acts as a guarantor of Israel’s security. Iran retaliated by striking Israel and US military bases in the region and targeting major cities in Gulf countries.

Tehran also effectively blocked the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow waterbody connecting the Gulf to the Arabian Sea, for most international commercial vessels, triggering a global energy crisis. About 20% of global petroleum supply passes through the maritime chokepoint.

Israel has been claiming that Iran is close to obtaining a nuclear weapon, which could alter the regional security balance. Tehran has long maintained that its nuclear programme is for civilian purposes.