The front page of the Javan newspaper (L) and the front page of the Jam Jam newspaper, showing a cartoon of US President Donald Trump drowning in the Strait of Hormuz with the headline “Marine Bluff”, are on sale at a newsstand in Tehran on April 13, 2026.
flour edge AFP | getty images
The US and Iran have escalated their war of words as a shaky ceasefire nears its end, with each side raising the stakes ahead of another attempt to reach a peace deal.
Iran’s parliamentary speaker, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, appeared to step forward a social media post On Tuesday, he criticized US President Donald Trump for “imposing a siege and violating the ceasefire” and trying to turn the talks into “a table of surrender or a table to justify renewed war”.
Ghalibaf also suggested Iran was making fresh gains in the standoff. “Over the past two weeks, we have prepared to reveal new cards on the battlefield,” Ghalibaf said without elaborating. He said, “We do not accept talks under the shadow of threats.”
The heated rhetoric came as Trump repeated his threat to bomb Iran with overwhelming military force if no deal was reached, saying “a lot of bombs are going to start going off.”
The status of further peace talks and other key details of current relations between the warring powers have become increasingly opaque, with Trump oscillating between resuming saber rhetoric and signaling Washington’s readiness for additional talks with Iran.
“This is the last chance to get an agreement before the ceasefire expires,” Mark Sievers, the former US ambassador to Oman, told CNBC’s “Access Middle East” on Monday. He warned that the risks were great if Trump followed through on his threat to resume military hostilities against Iran’s power plants and bridges.
Tensions rose as a US delegation prepared to return to Pakistan for a possible second round of peace talks. “The US delegation is planning to visit Islamabad soon,” a source familiar with the matter told CNBC on Monday morning.
Iran, for its part, has repeatedly denied that it will participate in the meeting. A delegation from Tehran plans to visit Islamabad on Tuesday for talks. According to The New York TimesCiting two Iranian officials.
The first round of talks in Islamabad, led by Vice President JD Vance and US special envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, ended on April 12 without any resolution to thorny issues such as Iran’s nuclear program.
The US and Iran agreed to a two-week ceasefire on the evening of April 7. Tensions have been rising during the short duration of the temporary ceasefire, with each side accusing the other of violating its terms.
in one Interview with Bloomberg On Monday, Trump said the ceasefire was set to expire “Wednesday evening Washington time”, potentially providing additional hours for negotiations. Trump said he is There is no possibility of expansion Iran will hold a ceasefire from Wednesday onwards and will not open the Strait of Hormuz until a deal is reached with Tehran.
Asked whether he would expect fighting to start immediately if an agreement failed to be reached, Trump said, “If there is no agreement, I would certainly expect that.”
upcoming peace talks
Cornelia Mayer, chief executive of Mayer Resources, said a diplomatic roadmap rather than a permanent solution is the most realistic outcome of the Islamabad talks. Referring to the Iran nuclear deal, which took more than two years of negotiations before reaching an initial outline in 2015, the mayor said that “hoping for a real peace deal is going too far.”
Vance is reportedly part of a US delegation to Pakistan for talks on Tuesday with officials from the National Security Council, the State Department and the Pentagon, according to multiple news outlets.
U.S. negotiators may be at a disadvantage by having Iran’s experienced diplomatic delegation at the negotiating table — a team of professionals who “know their portfolio,” said Alan Ayer, a former senior U.S. diplomat who helped negotiate the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, while the U.S. side lacks comparable expertise in international relations.
Unless the US brings “a team of competent experts that they trust … they are out of their league,” Eyre said, adding that the “best possible, realistic outcome” from potential talks would be an agreement on general principles and an extension of the ceasefire.
The fate of Iran’s nuclear material will remain a key issue in the negotiations. Trump said on Friday that Iran agreed to transfer its reserves Claim to supply highly enriched uranium to the US, which Iran rejected within hours.
one in satya social post Late Monday, Trump reiterated that America’s “Operation Midnight Hammer” — a June 2025 strike targeting three facilities critical to Tehran’s nuclear program — had succeeded in “completely destroying the nuclear dust sites” and that “ditching it up will be a long and difficult process.”
The US and Iran are also at an intense standoff over maritime traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, with Trump vowing to maintain a blockade of Iranian ports and Tehran reasserting military control over the vital waterway. In normal times the chokepoint is the route for 20% of the world’s oil and gas transit.
Further escalating tensions in the canal, the Iranian Foreign Ministry accused the US of attacking an Iranian commercial ship and demanded the release of its crew.
Over the weekend, the U.S. Navy fired on and seized an Iran-flagged cargo ship trying to bypass the blockade — the first significant encounter since the U.S. blockade began — while Tehran fired on two ships attempting to pass through, the latest escalation in the vital artery that has put the two sides on a collision course as the clock runs out in Islamabad.
“Any escalation, particularly military action around Hormuz, could lead to a renewed surge in oil prices and a broader risk-off move,” said Lloyd Chan, senior currency analyst at MUFG Global Markets Research.
— CNBC’s Kevin Breuninger contributed to this report.
