Lebanese officials say more than 1,950 people have been killed in weeks of hostilities, with more than 350 killed in Israeli attacks on Wednesday alone, which was the first full day of the US-Iran ceasefire.
Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said that making progress in the Islamabad talks would be a difficult task.
“A temporary ceasefire has been announced, but now an even more difficult phase lies ahead: the phase of achieving a permanent ceasefire, the phase of resolving complex issues through dialogue,” he said.
“This is the stage that is called the English equivalent of ‘make or break’.”
In Islamabad, all routes leading to the Serena Hotel, the expected venue for the talks, were closed with heavy security, while a large banner and digital signs on the expressway proclaimed “Islamabad Talks”.
In Tehran, a 30-year-old resident told AFP he doubted the talks would succeed, calling anything Trump says “pure noise and nonsense.”
Wall Street stocks rose sharply during the week and oil prices fell due to the fragile ceasefire between the United States and Iran.
During the week, all three major US indexes rose more than three percent. Oil prices fell once again on Friday. During the week, they fell by about 13 percent.