US-Iran Ceasefire Fails? Islamabad Peace Talks Delayed

Hello, I'm Maryam Mashiri and this is the Iran War Today, our daily briefing bringing you up to date with all you need to know on day 53 of the US-Israel war with Iran. Over the course of the next 10 minutes or so we'll get the latest from our teams across the world. We'll be live with Gary O'Donohue in Washington and with Azadeh Mashiri in Islamabad. Let's start there with some of today's key developments. President Trump says he expects to be bombing Iran if no progress is made in peace talks and he doesn't want to extend the ceasefire due to expire soon. Well I expect to be bombing because I think that's a better attitude to go in with but we're ready to go. I mean the military is raring to go. There's no confirmation that talks will go ahead in Islamabad. JD Vance is still in Washington whilst Iran is yet to decide if it will go. So far no decision has been made and I think the reason is very clear because of the confusing messages we have been receiving from the United States. China's president calls for the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz for the first time since the war began. And petrol thefts in the UK surge as the war pushes up fuel costs. They're up 72 percent, 62 percent compared with a year ago. Well let's start with those comments from President Trump. He says that he believes the US is in a very strong negotiating position with Iran but expects to be bombing if progress is not made in Iran's peace talks. Well time is running out before a temporary ceasefire between the United States and Iran ends. It's still unclear whether the talks in the Pakistani capital Islamabad will go ahead. The White House says US Vice President JD Vance who is expected to lead the delegation has not yet left Washington. Well Iranian state television said no delegation from Iran had gone to Islamabad. A spokesman told the BBC Iran was yet to decide on whether to go. The Iranian parliamentary speaker did say Tehran is preparing new cards on the battlefield if fighting with the US resumes. Well both Iran and Pakistan which is playing a key mediation role say the truce will end within the next few hours. But President Trump has suggested that it expires on Wednesday evening Washington time. Let's take a look now at some of what President Trump told CNBC when he spoke to them on the phone. What I think is that we're going to end up with a great deal. I think it's got, I think they have no choice. We've taken out their navy, we've taken out their air force, we've taken out their leaders frankly which does complicate things in one way but these leaders are much more rational. It's a, it is regime change no matter what you want to call it which is not something I said I was going to do but I've done it. Indirectly maybe but I've done it. And I think we're in a very strong negotiating position to do what other presidents should have done during a 47 year period. Well let's cross live to Islamabad and speak to our South Asia correspondent Azadeh Mashiri. Azadeh what are we hearing about whether or not these talks are actually going to go ahead? Well we've heard that the Iranian delegation was prepared to come to the negotiating table, was going to travel to Islamabad but that the moment that the United States fired on an Iranian flag cargo vessel is when everything changed. That's what an Iranian source told me earlier. Now that episode happened just days before these talks were due to happen and the White House may have thought that this would add some pressure to the Iranians at the negotiating table but instead Mariam we're seeing that neither delegation is here in Islamabad and that ceasefire is now due to expire with no word on whether it will be extended. And remember after weeks of war, of brute force, the United States didn't get the immediate political and military concessions that it was expecting from the Iranians. And now here in Pakistan the information minister has in a social media post said that the mediators are still trying to convince the Iranians to travel here and that's an acknowledgement, a formal acknowledgement of the fact that the Iranians are so far not showing any signs that they are going to travel here to Islamabad. So Mariam if we weren't sure whether these talks were going to happen before we're now very clear that they're up in the air. Azadeh thank you very much. Well let's get the view now from Iran. Our chief international correspondent Lise Doucette is allowed to report from Tehran on condition none of her material is used on the BBC's Persian service. This is her assessment of whether the Iranians will attend any talks. We just got back from Iran's foreign ministry saw no sign there of any delegations preparing to travel. We were told that the foreign minister Abbas Araqchi and his close aides were locked in meetings behind closed doors. They were still exchanging you can imagine frantic messages through the mediators. So we sat down with the senior foreign ministry official Ismail Bagayi. He had been at the last round of talks in Islamabad and asked him what was the So far no decision has been made and I think the reason is very clear because of the confusing messages we have been receiving from the United States. Confusing messages he said and that includes those posts from President Trump threatening military action. Also the situation in the Strait of Hormuz where for the first time the U.S. Navy fired on, boarded and seized an vessel but I put it to him that President Trump said it's Iran which is violating the ceasefire by not opening that strategic strait. He pointed out that last week they did announce the strait would be open on routes coordinated by Iran but then President Trump immediately announced thank you in capital letters and said their U.S. naval blockade would stay in force. So the two sides locked in disagreement while the clock is ticking down on Iranian time the ceasefire should expire in a number of hours. The Chinese President Xi Jinping has called for the opening of the Strait of Hormuz for the first time since the closure of the vital energy passageway. Speaking by phone to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, President Xi said the Strait of Hormuz should remain open for normal passage which aligns with the common interest of countries in the Our China correspondent Stephen Macdonald has this assessment of what was said by President Xi. Well it's not so much the lines that are important because in a way this is what the Chinese government via its various spokespeople has been saying throughout that there needs to be discussion, there needs to be a respect for everyone's sovereignty with a view to reopening the Strait of Hormuz to normal shipping traffic. The difference is that it's Xi Jinping saying it this time in a conversation with the Saudi Crown Prince. Now in that conversation or at least from the readout we get from that conversation he wasn't blaming anyone directly but in the past the Chinese government has said that this really is all the U.S. and Israel's fault for starting this war and that they're the ones who should be taking the main initiative to ease off on all of the hostilities. Interestingly from the Saudi side we had the Crown Prince saying that China and Saudi Arabia should work together to find a pathway to lasting peace and stability in the region. Now some are interpreting that as possibly him hinting to Xi Jinping that perhaps Beijing could be doing more to lean on Iran to get the Strait opened but there is an element of tea leaf reading in this because this is all this diplomatic speak that we're trying to unpack. Well here in the UK the Chancellor Rachel Reeves has today said that economically Britain was well placed if the conflict continued but the price of petrol and diesel has risen quickly in the last six weeks since the start of the Iran war. Independent petrol retailers have told the BBC they've seen a big rise in petrol theft. Simon Browning has more. 151 pounds stolen by this white van. Blatant, unashamed. 110 pounds stolen here. The youngster fills up before an adult drives off. Fuel prices have rocketed since the war in Iran disrupted the global flow of oil. They've stabilised in recent days but everyone is paying more. In Coventry, just after meeting forecourt owner Paul, petrol theft again. I don't know what, he's already got 36 on there. A few moments of confusion then reality dawns. Drive-off? Is that a drive-off? Yeah. Is that a regular thing? So this week so far it's been one a day. Paul's now bought new theft tech to combat losses. Yeah well we get hit inside and outside the shop so you know people are stealing the fuel on the forecourt and then they're stealing the products inside the shop as well. Josh has five garages in the south of England. He didn't want to show his face as staff abuse has risen. They've been accused of profiteering, they've had people you know calling them thieves, shouting at them. It's quite intimidating for these guys. We're probably at five drive-offs per site per week now whereas historically it was probably one to two. Retailers like Josh feel in a trap. People are stealing, they're also saying they can't pay for it and far from making more profits people are buying less fuel so takings are down. Petrol retailers and their trade body say a surge in abuse is linked to claims drivers are being ripped off. The government said thieves must face the full force of the law and abusing people at work is unacceptable. Simon Browning, BBC News. Well to finish let's take stock of where we think President Trump is and what he might do next. Live now to our Chief North America Correspondent Gary O'Donoghue and Gary just talk us through first of all the likelihood of JD Vance, the Vice President, actually making that journey to Islamabad. What are we hearing? Well he hasn't left yet so time is running out in terms of the deadline for the end of the ceasefire sometime tomorrow night Wednesday evening local time in the US and we're hearing unconfirmed reports at the moment, anonymous sourced reports from American media that the trip is on hold as it's described, that there is a pause because they haven't had a satisfactory response they say from the Iranians in terms of what they're prepared to talk about. These reports say that the trip hasn't been cancelled at this stage so we seem to be in this kind of limbo where they won't get on the plane unless they think there's a reasonable chance a that the Iranians will will show up in Islamabad and b that they will be prepared to talk substantively but even if that happened in the next five minutes there's still gonna be a very limited amount of time you know it's a 14, 15, 16 hour flight from here to Islamabad so they wouldn't get there until you know tomorrow morning effectively Wednesday morning so a lot of uncertainty at the moment a lot of uncertainty about whether there's anything to talk about and that deadline that's already been extended by a day by the President and him saying he's not really minded to extend it any further. And him also saying that if he doesn't get some sort of agreement then he's happy to start bombing Iran again. What is the mood in Washington now given all of this rhetoric that we're hearing from the President and the fact that Mr Vance hasn't even started that journey yet? Well I think there's a lot of frustration around because the the tough talk if you like the the kind of we'll bomb even more, we'll destroy infrastructure, we'll target other stuff that's been mentioned by the President, bridges, roads etc that doesn't seem to be bringing Iran any closer to the table. Taking that oil tanker off Sri Lanka may have been aimed at trying to persuade them to come to the table that doesn't seem to have worked either and at the same time there's this you know problem this political problem that whenever you set time limits and deadlines that if you don't stick to them and you don't follow through on them and nothing substantive happens then you can end up looking weak and that is the last thing this President is prepared to do which is end up looking weak. So there's a lot coming together here a critical moment in this this conflict where hostilities could break out all over again and things could get an awful lot worse but there doesn't seem to be like doesn't seem to be like there's a coming together of minds on any of the substantive issues namely the opening of the strait of course that that crucial crucial artery out of the gulf into the Arabian sea and the wider world and then the question of Iran's ability to enrich uranium for nuclear purposes and whether or not they really do want to bomb and all that kind of thing so there's no movement here by the look of it. Gary thank you. Well whether you're joining us on YouTube, TikTok, sounds, radio or TV thank you for your time. We'll be back at the same time tomorrow with the Iran war today.