Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, addressing his cabinet, today said that Islamabad’s efforts to get US and Iran back on the table and make a settlement to end the ongoing war is currently stuck in a costly stalemate, though efforts “are still ongoing”.
“Due to the war, our journey of economic development has come to a halt; petroleum prices are soaring to the skies; mountains of problems stand before us, but we will emerge successfully from this difficult time,” predicted Sharif, who, along with a couple other senior Pakistani figures, has acted as the main route of communication between Washington and Tehran.
Releasing a statement on his social media account, the Pakistani premier said that the country’s Army chief and Chief of Defence Forces, Field Marshal Asim Munir, along with Foreign Minister and Deputy PM Ishaq Dar “also remained engaged” with their counterparts from the US and Iran, in a bid to get both nations at the table once again, as hostilities during the volatile ceasefire have only risen.
“Due to our immense efforts, the ceasefire has been extended, which is still ongoing,” he noted, referring to President Donald Trump’s announcement of an indefinite extension, which the American leader said was to give Iran more time to present a peace proposal, claiming that Tehran was virtually leaderless due to the joint US-Israel decapitation strikes eliminating most of its leadership.
