Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan joined his counterparts from Pakistan, Egypt and Saudi Arabia in Islamabad on March 29 for high-level talks aimed at ending the fighting in the Middle East, as Israel and the United States continue strikes on Iran and Tehran responds with missile and drone attacks across the region.
Fidan held a bilateral meeting with Pakistan's Ishaq Dar ahead of the four-way talks, Turkish diplomatic sources said. The Turkish top diplomat was also expected to meet other officials individually on the sidelines of the two-day summit.
Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said he and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian held “extensive discussions” on regional hostilities.
More than 3,000 people have been killed throughout the monthlong war that began with U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran, triggering Iran's attacks on Israel and neighboring Gulf Arab states. The war has also threatened oil and gas supplies, with Iran’s grip on the strategic Strait of Hormuz shaking markets.
The U.S. and Israel were not participating in the talks in Pakistan. The U.S. has sent additional troops to the Middle East, while Yemen’s Houthi rebels entered the fighting over the weekend, threatening to widen the war and further hurt global shipping.
Israel announced waves of incoming strikes from Iran on Sunday and explosions could be heard throughout Tehran.
Egypt’s Badr Abdelatty and Saudi Arabia’s Prince Faisal Bin Farhan were in Islamabad as part of talks scheduled days after the U.S. offered Iran a 15-point “action list,” delivered through Pakistan as a framework for a possible peace deal. Abdelatty said the meetings were aimed at opening a “direct dialogue” between the U.S. and Iran, which have largely communicated through mediators during the war.
Iranian officials have publicly rejected the U.S. framework and dismissed the idea of negotiating under pressure. Still, Press TV, the English-language arm of Iran’s state broadcaster, reported that Tehran had drafted its own five-point proposal, citing an anonymous official.
The plan reportedly calls for a halt to the killing of Iranian officials, guarantees against future attacks, reparations for the war, an end to hostilities and Iran’s “exercise of sovereignty over the Strait of Hormuz.”
The weekend provided little sign of the talks narrowing the disconnect between the U.S. and Iran. U.S. officials have insisted the war may be nearing an inflection point but Iranian leaders continue to publicly reject negotiations.
To the contrary, the United States has dispatched thousands of additional Marines and paratroopers to the region. And the Iran-backed Houthis, who govern parts of Yemen, announced their long-awaited entry into the war, launching missiles toward what they called “sensitive Israeli military sites” for the first time on March 28.
Despite the deployments, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on March 27 that Washington “can achieve all of our objectives without ground troops” as domestic opposition grows to expanding the war to a potential ground invasion, including among Republicans.
Tehran threatens retaliatory strikes on Israeli, US universities
Iran on March 29 warned of additional escalation after airstrikes hit several universities, including ones that Israel claimed were used for nuclear research and development.
The paramilitary Revolutionary Guard warned in a statement that Iran would consider Israeli universities and branches of American universities in the region “legitimate targets” without safety assurances for Iranian universities, state media reported.
