ISLAMABAD, Pakistan—President Trump scrapped a trip by U.S. envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner to Pakistan for talks with Iran, leaving himself tough choices over how to force Iran to make concessions the White House wants to strike a deal.
Trump said on Saturday that he had decided to cancel the trip after receiving an offer from Iran that fell short of the White House’s expectations. “We’re not going to spend 15 hours in airplanes all the time, going back and forth, to be given a document that was not good enough,” he said.
He added that the Iranians had sent a much better offer 10 minutes after he canceled the trip, saying it involved Iran not having a nuclear weapon as part of a deal.
Witkoff and Kushner had been expected to travel to Islamabad for a potential meeting with Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, but U.S. and Iranian officials say the two sides remain far apart on issues such as the U.S. blockade, the closure of the Strait of Hormuz and Tehran’s nuclear program.
“It remains to be seen whether the United States really has a serious will to advance diplomacy,” Araghchi told Iran’s official IRNA news agency. He held talks with mediators in Pakistan on Saturday before departing to travel to Oman and Russia.
If Araghchi concludes a deal is possible after consulting the mediators, both sides could still meet in the coming days, said an Iranian diplomat and other people briefed on the effort.
The deadlock over talks leaves Trump with uncomfortable choices. He can escalate the conflict, settle for the kind of deal he didn’t want or continue to use the blockade to bring pressure on Iran to compromise.
Trump has appeared reluctant to return to fighting, potentially pulling the U.S. deeper into a conflict that he had wanted to end within four to six weeks. Keeping the blockade in place, while the Iranians prevent the Strait of Hormuz from opening, risks doing further damage to the global economy.
Trump blamed internal divisions in Iran for the cancellation of Saturday’s trip. “There is tremendous infighting and confusion within their ‘leadership,’” he said in a post on social media. “Nobody knows who is in charge, including them.”
Tehran’s hard-liners, long opposed to a rapprochement with the West, have argued the U.S. should not be trusted after it and Israel twice launched strikes on Iran in the middle of negotiations with Washington.
“The Iranians don’t want to meet face-to-face until their positions are closer together” with the U.S., said Sanam Vakil, a Middle East director at Chatham House, a think tank in London. “They don’t see value in meeting because it gives Trump too much control of the narrative that they are desperate to talk.”
An initial round of talks in Pakistan led by Vice President JD Vance collapsed earlier this month. Vance also had to cancel a trip earlier this week after Iran refused to commit to meet. The vice president is now on standby to travel in case there is progress in the negotiations, the White House said late Friday.
Diplomatic efforts appeared to pick up Friday when Araghchi arrived in Islamabad. He was there officially to send messages to the U.S. via Pakistan, his spokesman said.
Both sides are grappling with a set of interlocking issues that stand in the way of a long-term end to the conflict. That includes differences of opinion over the terms of the deal that halted fighting early this month.
Tehran is insisting the U.S. end a blockade on its ports before any talks can resume. Washington imposed the restrictions after Iran effectively closed the Strait of Hormuz, a passage where a fifth of the world’s oil once transited.
“Both sides think they have the upper hand,” said Ali Vaez, director of the Iran project at the International Crisis Group. “They should reopen maritime traffic simultaneously.”
In Pakistan, Araghchi said Saturday he had discussed the end of Israel’s offensive against Hezbollah in Lebanon. The U.S. announced a cease-fire between the two sides earlier this month to allow talks with Iran to go forward.
But fighting has continued. Israel hit southern and eastern Lebanon with a wave of strikes on Saturday, saying it was working to eliminate rocket launchers and “immediate threats” to Israeli troops and civilians.
Even if the two sides were to resolve their differences over Lebanon and the blockade, they will need to bridge the gap on Iran’s nuclear program. The U.S. wants Iran to transfer its highly enriched uranium stockpiles out of the country and to eliminate Iran’s ability to enrich uranium domestically.
Tehran says keeping the nuclear program, which was badly damaged by U.S. attacks last summer, is a red line. “Negotiations can only lead to a proper outcome when our adversaries recognize our nation’s right to the peaceful use of nuclear energy,” Iran’s ambassador to India, Mohammad Fathali, said on social media Saturday.
There has been some movement on enrichment. The U.S. is currently demanding a 20-year suspension of enrichment, and officials from mediating countries say the U.S. might be willing to allow Iran to carry out some enrichment related work during the second decade.
Iran has said it could be open to a five-year suspension of enrichment with a possible additional five years in which its enrichment program would remain restricted, according to people close to the talks.
While the U.S. and Iran are struggling to make progress toward a deal, both sides appear reluctant to resume fighting. Trump extended the cease-fire deal earlier this week.
He has, nonetheless, kept up his threats against Iran. Iran has told Pakistan that ending such threats could help convince hard-liners that now is time to restart talks, according to an Iranian diplomat and other people briefed on the communications.
With Islamabad on standby to host talks should they go forward, life in the capital has been upended in recent days. The city’s central districts remained largely on lockdown Saturday with entrance points largely sealed. Checkpoints have been set to stop both commuters and cargo trucks. Flashing cars carrying heavily armed policemen are patrolling the capital.
Araghchi was due to head to Oman, which has served as a bridge to Arab countries, and then onto Moscow. Russia has warm ties with Tehran and is seen as a possible place where Iran could transfer its uranium stockpiles.
Write to Benoit Faucon at benoit.faucon@wsj.com, Laurence Norman at laurence.norman@wsj.com and Natalie Andrews at natalie.andrews@wsj.com