Ishaq Dar Raises Trump Iran Ceasefire Efforts in Call With Wang Yi
Pakistani Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar discussed Pakistan’s ongoing efforts to facilitate engagement between Iran and the United States during a call with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, putting trump iran ceasefire diplomacy back into view. The conversation came as Trump is set to travel to China this week for talks with President Xi Jinping, with officials saying Iran will be on the agenda.
Pakistan and Wang Yi
Dar’s call with Wang was the clearest sign in the source that Pakistan is trying to keep a channel open between Tehran and Washington. Pakistan has framed that effort around engagement, while China is now being discussed as a possible lever in the deadlock that has left Iran and the United States far apart.
Sultan Barakat, a professor at Hamad Bin Khalifa University in Qatar, said he thinks Beijing can be the “changing factor” in the apparent diplomatic deadlock between Washington and Tehran. Barakat said China has got to come in and use its diplomacy but also a little bit of pressure on all sides.
Trump, Xi Jinping, and Iran
Trump’s trip to China this week adds a second diplomatic track with direct relevance to Iran. Officials have said Iran will be on the agenda when Trump meets Xi Jinping, which gives Beijing a broader opening to hear Washington’s position while Pakistan pushes its own facilitation effort.
Barakat said, “they have been maybe doing it quietly behind closed doors, but if you just leave it to the United States’s and Iran’s and the Israelis’ interests, I don’t think we’re going to move much further.” That comment reflects the friction in the diplomacy: Pakistan is trying to facilitate engagement, but the United States, Iran and China are all now part of the same conversation.
Strait of Hormuz Pressure
The wider backdrop is already straining regional shipping and energy flows. The US-Israel war on Iran has disrupted global supplies of energy, fertilisers, medicines and helium, while fighting involving Yemen’s Houthis had already turned vessels away from the Red Sea and Suez Canal since 2023.
Restrictions on transit through the Strait of Hormuz imposed by Iran and the United States have amplified that shift, widening the pressure on trade routes that had already been rerouted. A study presented this month at a meeting of the International Whaling Commission also warned that rising shipping traffic near South Africa’s coast has substantially increased the risks of whales being struck.
For Pakistan, the immediate question is whether Dar’s channel-building effort finds traction in Beijing while Trump is in China this week. The next diplomatic signal will come from what Trump and Xi Jinping say about Iran, and whether China uses that opening to press the talks Dar is trying to keep alive.
