ISLAMABAD (AP) — President Donald Trump is sending his envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner to Pakistan to meet with Iran’s foreign minister, the White House said Friday, as officials in the South Asian nation pushed to revive ceasefire talks between the U.S. and Iran.

The talks planned for Saturday come as much of the world is on edge over a war that has snarled crucial energy exports through the Strait of Hormuzclouded the global economic picture and left thousands dead across the Middle East.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi arrived in Islamabad late Friday. Earlier on social media, he wrote that he was traveling to Pakistan on a trip focused on “bilateral matters and regional developments.” He didn’t specify who he would meet.

Shortly after Araghchi touched down, the country’s government made it clear there would be no direct negotiations with American government representatives during this visit.

Foreign ministry spokesman Esmael Baqaei said on X that, “No meeting is planned to take place between Iran and the U.S.”

Instead, Baqaei said Pakistani officials would convey messages between the delegations. Baqaei thanked the Pakistani government for its “ongoing mediation & good offices for ending American imposed war of aggression.”

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt had said in an interview on Fox News Channel that Witkoff and Kushner would meet with Araghchi.

“We’re hopeful that it will be a productive conversation and hopefully move the ball forward to a deal,” Leavitt said.

She said Vice President JD Vance would not travel but that he remains “deeply involved,” and would be willing to go to Pakistan “if we feel it’s a necessary use of his time.”

Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and the president’s national security team are on “standby” to fly to Pakistan if needed, Leavitt said.

Araghchi and the two Trump envoys held hours of indirect talks in Geneva on Feb. 27 over Tehran’s nuclear program, but walked away without a deal. The next day, Israel and the United States started the war against Iran.

Leavitt said the president decided to send Witkoff and Kushner to Pakistan “to hear the Iranians out.”

“We’ve certainly seen some progress from the Iranian side in the last couple of days,” Leavitt said. She did not offer any details about what U.S. officials were hearing.

Islamabad has sought to reinject momentum into the negotiations between Iran and the United States, which did not resume this week as had been expected.

Trump extends the Jones Act waiver for 90 days

Separately Friday, the White House said Trump issued a 90-day extension to the Jones Act waivermaking it easier for non-American vessels to transport oil and natural gas.

He first announced a 60-day waiver in March in a move intended to stabilize energy prices and ease oil and gas shipments to the U.S. following the effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz.

“New data compiled since the initial waiver was issued revealed that significantly more supply was able to reach U.S. ports faster,” the White House post on social media said.

The price of Brent crude oil, the international standard, retreated on the news, vacillating between $103 a barrel and more than $107 — still early 50% higher than where it was on Feb. 28, when the war began.

The squeeze on shipments through the strait has rippled through global maritime trade flows, including through the Panama Canal nearly halfway around the world.

Pakistan forges ahead with diplomatic efforts

Pakistan has been trying to get U.S. and Iranian officials back to the table after Trump this week announced an indefinite extension of the ceasefire with Iranhonoring Islamabad’s request for more time for diplomatic outreach.

That hasn’t lowered tensions in the straita strategic waterway through which a fifth of the world’s oil and natural gas is shipped during peacetime.

Iran has kept its stranglehold on traffic through the strait, attacking three ships earlier this week, while the U.S. is maintaining a blockade on Iranian ports and Trump has ordered the military to “shoot and kill” small boats that could be placing mines.

“Iran has an important choice, a chance to make a deal, a good deal, a wise deal,” U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told reporters on Friday. He said a second U.S. aircraft carrier will join the blockade in a few days.

Washington already has three aircraft carriers in the region; the USS George H.W. Bush in the Indian Ocean; the USS Abraham Lincoln in the Arabian Sea; and the USS Gerald R. Ford in the Red Sea.

It is the first time since 2003 that three American carriers have been operating in the region simultaneously. The force includes 200 aircraft and 15,000 sailors and Marines, U.S. Central Command said.

A growing toll even as ceasefires hold

Since the war began, at least 3,375 people have been killed in Iran, and more than 2,490 people in Lebanon, where new fighting between Israel and the Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah broke out two days after the war started, according to authorities.

Additionally, 23 people have died in Israel and more than a dozen in Gulf Arab states. Fifteen Israeli soldiers in Lebanon and 13 U.S. service members throughout the region have been killed.

The U.N. peacekeeping force in southern Lebanon has also sustained casualties. UNIFIL said Friday that an Indonesian peacekeeper died of wounds sustained in an attack on his base on March 29, raising to six — four Indonesians and two French — the number of force members killed since the war erupted.

Tensions linger in Lebanon despite extended truce

The situation in Lebanon remained tense a day after Trump announced Israel and Lebanon had agreed to extend a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah by three weeks. Hezbollah has not participated in the diplomacy brokered by Washington.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in a video statement released by his office on Friday, hailed “a process to achieve a historic peace between Israel and Lebanon.”

Earlier, the Israeli army asked residents of the southern Lebanese village of Deir Aames to evacuate, saying Hezbollah was using the village to launch attacks against Israel.

Israel’s military said it downed a drone over Lebanon following the launch of a small surface-to-air missile by Hezbollah. The militant group, meanwhile, said it shot down an Israeli drone with a surface-to-air missile over the outskirts of the southern port city of Tyre.

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Gambrell reported from Dubai, United Arab Emirates, and Keaten from Geneva. Associated Press writers David Rising in Bangkok; Koral Saeed in Abu Snan, Israel; Bassem Mroue in Beirut; and Aamer Madhani, Josh Boak and Ashraf Khalil in Washington contributed.

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trumpwho helped push the term “ fake news ” into the mainstream, now seems to have a new favorite subject: fake math.

During a Thursday event announcing a deal with drugmaker Regeneron to lower the cost of its pharmaceutical productsTrump defended his past claims that prices on prescription medications had been cut by well over 100% — something that is mathematically impossible without manufacturers dropping prices to zero and then presumably paying consumers to use their product.

Trump acknowledged having boasted that his efforts to lower drug prices had reduced what consumers pay by “500%, 600%.” But he added, “We also sometimes say 50%, 60%” and called it a “different kind of calculation” that could go up to “70, 80 and 90%.”

“People understand that better,” Trump said. “But they’re two ways of calculating” and “either way, it doesn’t make any difference.”

There could indeed be two ways of calculating such things — but the difference is very important. One is correct. The other is nonmathematical.

It was one of several times Trump used his own — but incorrect — math during the drug pricing event. He claimed the 7 1/2-week-and-still-going Iran war actually fell within the four- to six-week timeline he predicted early on. The president also brought up the crowd size for his 2017 inauguration — a subject that led onetime top Trump adviser Kellyanne Conway to unwittingly make the phrase “ alternative facts ” famous.

Trump’s incorrect take on percentages — something he has long repeated — came just after his health chief, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., brought up the issue on his own during the same Oval Office event Thursday.

Kennedy noted that he was reminded of his exchange the previous day with Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., at a congressional hearing when she said that claiming price cuts exceeding 100% might suggest “companies should be paying you to take their drugs.”

Kennedy said during the hearing that Trump “has a different way of calculating.”

On Thursday, Kennedy argued that drug manufacturers had raised prices on popular medications by more than 100% and that Trump was then cutting the price down substantially — meaning he was wiping out percentages of costs worth more than 100%.

“If the drug was $100, and it raised the price to $600, that would be a 600% rise,” Kennedy said — even though that’s incorrect. Six hundred is indeed 600% of the original 100 value, but the increase from one to the other is actually only 500%.

Kennedy then continued, “And the president used that mathematical device.”

But no such device exists for the way Trump characterizes it — at least not when math is done correctly.

Something can increase in price by more than 100%. A product that increases from $1 to $2.10 has increased by 110%. But prices cannot be reduced by more than 100% without being pushed to a value of $0 — or reduced 100% of the full price — and then into negative territory, where consumers presumably would need to be paid for using a product.

In a subsequent question-and-answer session with reporters during the price announcement event, meanwhile, Trump offered another dash of fake math for how long the war in Iranwhich began Feb. 28, had been going on.

Asked about the war having exceeding the four to six weeks he originally suggested it would last, Trump argued that he’d actually met his own timeline because Iran’s military was “decimated” by then.

The U.S. and Iran agreed to a ceasefire this month, and Trump announced this week that he was extending it. But neither side says the war is overand a conclusion that hasn’t been achieved certainly did n’t occur in the four to six weeks that have already elapsed.

Trump also brought up his 2017 inaugural crowd size issue on Thursday, when talking about renovations at the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool. He noted that Martin Luther King Jr. had drawn hundreds of thousands of people to the National Mall for his “I Have a Dream” speech in 1963 and claimed: “I had the same exact crowd. Maybe a little bit more,” arguing that pictures of both events backed him up.

“I actually had more people,” Trump added. “But that’s OK.”

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — President Donald Trump has ordered the U.S. military to “shoot and kill” small Iranian boats that deploy mines in the Strait of Hormuzannouncing the move Thursday a day after Iran again displayed its ability to thwart traffic through the channel.

Trump also announced that a ceasefire in Lebanon would be extended by three weeks.

His post on social media about the small boats came shortly after the U.S. military seized another tanker associated with the smuggling of Iranian oil, ratcheting up a standoff with Tehran over the strait through which 20% of all crude oil and natural gas traded passed during peacetime.

“I have ordered the United States Navy to shoot and kill any boat, small boats though they may be … putting mines in the waters of the Strait of Hormuz,” Trump posted, adding that U.S. minesweepers “are clearing the Strait right now.”

“I am hereby ordering that activity to continue, but at a tripled up level!” he added.

The decision to extend a pause in fighting between Israel and the Hezbollah militant group in Lebanon came during a meeting at the White House between the Israeli and Lebanese ambassadors to the United States.

Meanwhile, it was still unclear when, or if, the U.S. and Iran would meet again in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad, where mediators are trying to bring the countries together to reach a diplomatic deal ending that conflict.

Negotiations initially planned this week have not happened. Iran insists it will not attend until the U.S. ends its blockade on Iranian ports and ships. The White House insists it will not take part until Tehran opens the strait to international traffic.

Pope Leo XIVreturning home from a trip to Africa, urged the U.S. and Iran to return to talks to end the war.

Footage shows US forces on deck of tanker

The Defense Department released video footage of U.S. forces on the deck of the oil tanker Majestic X, which was seized in the Indian Ocean. The ship had been flying a Guyanese flag, though the South American nation of Guyana said it was not registered there

The footage emerged a day after Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard attacked three cargo ships in the strait, capturing two of them, in an assault that raised new concerns about the safety of shipping through the waterway.

The powerful head of Iran’s judiciary, Gholam Hossein Mohseni Ejeisaid three “violating ships” in the strait were “subject to enforcement” Wednesday.

“The show of strength by the armed forces of Islamic Iran in the Strait of Hormuz is a source of pride,” he wrote Thursday on X, claiming the Americans “lack the courage” to approach the strait.

Ship-tracking data showed the Majestic X in the Indian Ocean between Sri Lanka and Indonesia, roughly the same location as the oil tanker Tifani, seized earlier by American forces. It had been bound for Zhoushan, China.

Majestic X previously was named Phonix and had been sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury Department in 2024 for smuggling Iranian crude oil in contravention of U.S. sanctions against the Islamic Republic.

Guyana said in a statement the Majestic X was not registered in the South American nation.

“While the name of the vessel has changed, the (International Maritime Organization) number remains recorded in the international database as PHONIX. There is no record of this vessel or name in Guyana’s registry. Therefore, the ship is FRAUDULENTLY flying the Guyana flag,” Guyana’s Maritime Administration Department said.

There was no immediate response from Iran about the seizure.

Trump claims leadership rift in Iran

Trump this week extended a ceasefire to give the Iranian leadership more time to come up with a “unified proposal” on ending the war, while maintaining an American blockade of Iranian ports.

In a post Thursday, Trump claimed a leadership rift between moderates and hard-liners was confounding Iran. “Iran is having a very hard time figuring out who their leader is! They just don’t know!” Trump said.

Trump has repeatedly said during the ceasefire that began April 8 that his team is dealing with Iranian officials who want to make a deal, while acknowledging that his decision to kill several top leaders has come with complications.

Iran’s president and its parliament speaker posted statements on social media declaring the country has no hard-liners or moderates.

“We are all Iranians and revolutionaries,” they said.

A spokesperson for the Iranian Foreign Ministry said Trump’s claim of a leadership rift was a “deflection.” Other Iranian officials said on social media that the country was united.

Trump, while speaking to reporters at the White House, pushed back against questions about the conflict exceeding the four-to-six-week timeline that he and aides previously set for the war.

“I don’t want to rush myself,” Trump said, adding that the U.S. “took the country out” militarily in the first four weeks.

“Now all we’re doing is sitting back and seeing what deal” can be made. “And if they don’t want to make a deal, then I’ll finish it up militarily,” Trump said.

He said he would not use a nuclear weapon against Iran.

Meanwhile, three aircraft carriers were in the region after the USS George H.W. Bush arrived in the Indian Ocean. One carrier was in the Arabian Sea and another was in the Red Sea, military officials said.

Talks between Lebanon and Israel lead to truce extension

Trump said a second round of talks between Israel and Lebanon in Washington “went very well” and resulted in a ceasefire extension for Israel and the Hezbollah militant group.

“The United States is going to work with Lebanon in order to help it protect itself from Hezbollah,” Trump said on his Truth Social platform.

The latest war between Israel and Hezbollah started after Israel and the U.S. launched attacks on Iran and the Tehran-backed militants fired rockets into northern Israel. The ceasefire first took effect for a 10-day period starting Friday.

Underscoring the truce’s fragility, Israel’s military said it struck missile launchers in Lebanon that had fired into its borders. Hezbollah said it fired at the Israeli town of Shtula in response to Israeli attacks on the Lebanese village of Yater.

Lebanon’s public health ministry said an Israeli airstrike killed three people further north, in the area of Nabatiya. The Israeli military said it killed three militants who launched a missile toward an Israeli warplane.

Each side has accused the other of breaching the truce.

Trump reiterated that the U.S. continues to demand that Iran stop it’s backing of Iranian-allied militias in the Mideast, including Hezbollah in Lebanon, as part of any deal between Washington and Tehran to end the U.S. war on Iran.

“Yeah, they’ll have to cut that,” Trump said to a reporter’s question about aiding Hezbollah. “That’s a must.”

Threats to shipping persist

Since the Feb. 28 start of the war between Iran, Israel and the United States, over 30 ships have come under attack in the waters of the Persian Gulf, the Strait of Hormuz and the Gulf of Oman.

The threat of attack, rising insurance premiums and other fears have stopped traffic from moving through the strait. Iran’s ability to restrict traffic through the strait, which leads from the Persian Gulf to the open ocean, has proved a major strategic advantage.

Jakob Larsen, the head of maritime security for BIMCO, the largest international association representing shipowners, said in a note Thursday that most shipping companies need a stable ceasefire and assurances from both sides of the conflict that the strait is safe for transit.

The threat of mines, he wrote, was a “particular concern” if traffic might return to normal levels one day.

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Madhani reported from Washington, and Keaten reported from Geneva.

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This story has corrected that the Majestic X oil tanker had been flying the Guyanese flag not the Guinea flag.