Pakistan PM and Army Chief Return Home; Af-Pak Second Urumqi Round Pending

Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif returned from the Antalya Diplomacy Forum in Turkey, while Army Chief Field Marshal Asim Munir departed Tehran after completing a three-day visit to Iranian leadership. Both missions concluded without a confirmed date for a second round of US-Iran talks, but Pakistan maintained that diplomacy remained active. The ceasefire in the US-Iran war was set to expire around April 22, creating continued urgency. On the Afghanistan-Pakistan front, the Urumqi non-escalation commitment continued to hold as of April 18. The second round of China-mediated Af-Pak peace talks — originally described as due at 'end of April' in the April 9 Urumqi communiqué — was expected imminently, pending Pakistani coordination. Afghanistan's Taliban government maintained the non-escalation posture but continued to press for Pakistan to cease border shelling and reopen Torkham to full commercial trade. The relative calm on the Af-Pak front since April 9 — nearly ten consecutive days without major military incidents — marked the longest uninterrupted lull since Operation Ghazab-il-Haq began on February 26, 2026.