U.S. President says two-week truce ends Wednesday evening Washington time, warns conflict could resume if no agreement is reached while negotiations continue via Pakistan
President Donald Trump said he considers the April 7 ceasefire with Iran to have expired on Wednesday and indicated he is in no rush to negotiate a new agreement.
Trump made the remarks during a phone interview on April 20 with Jeff Mason of Bloomberg.
“We’ve got all the time in the world,” Trump said, adding that he views the ceasefire as ending “Wednesday evening Washington time” and that he is unlikely to extend it further if no deal is reached.
The ceasefire began on the evening of April 7 and was initially scheduled to last two weeks.
During that 14-day period, the U.S. Navy initiated an ocean blockade in the Strait of Hormuz on April 13, aiming to pressure Iran’s economy and push Tehran toward a resolution.
The Trump administration had not responded to requests for comment by the time of publication.
When asked whether fighting would resume immediately if negotiations fail, Trump said, “If there’s no deal, I would certainly expect so.”
The United States had agreed to suspend strikes on the condition that Iran reopen the Strait of Hormuz to international shipping.
The conflict traces back to Feb. 28, when Trump ordered pre-emptive strikes on Iran alongside Israeli forces under Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
“I’m not going to be rushed into making a bad deal,” Trump said. “We’ve got all the time in the world.”
Mason noted that Trump’s reference to a Wednesday expiration appeared inconsistent with the expected 14-day timeline.
“The two week period that most people were assuming goes through tomorrow Tuesday,” Mason said in a television interview. “So, that was interesting.”
He added that Trump compared the timeline to the duration of past conflicts, including the Korean War, the Vietnam War, and the War in Afghanistan.
“He was couching this timeline or his own timeline to the fact that many other wars had gone on for a long time,” Mason said.
Vice President J. D. Vance is expected to depart for Pakistan, though Mason noted there were indications he may have already arrived in Islamabad.
Pakistan is serving as the primary neutral ground and intermediary for the talks.
“[Trump] gave a little bit of detail about when the talks were expected to happen,” Mason said. “He said that they were likely to be on Tuesday night and Wednesday morning…and that JD Vance was expected to leave later on in the day today, Monday, which contradicted what he said to another reporter at another news outlet earlier, where he suggested that the vice president was already en route. So the next step are these talks.”
