Sarah: Pakistan’s army chief is back in Tehran—while Washington tightens the economic vise and the bill for this war keeps coming due.
Sarah: Here’s how we got here: the U.S.-Iran negotiating channel has been stuck since the June 17 memorandum expired without a final peace deal.
Sarah: The unresolved package covers reopening Hormuz, sanctions, nuclear terms, and demands to end the war.
Sarah: Iran says the frozen-funds relief promised after the Switzerland talks still hasn’t arrived.
Sarah: Pakistan has mediated throughout the war and kept in touch with both sides.
Rich: This is Iran War Daily.
Rich: Munir’s third Tehran trip comes amid a sanctions rollout, mounting U.S.
Rich: casualties, and a fuel-price squeeze around the world—so what can this visit actually move?
Sarah: Al Jazeera writes:
Quote: Pakistan’s Chief of Army Staff and Chief of Defence Forces
Quote: Field Marshal Asim Munir
Quote: is traveling to Tehran on Monday for talks with senior Iranian officials
Quote: Iran’s Foreign Ministry announced on Sunday.
Quote: It will be Munir’s third visit to Iran this year as Islamabad continues its push to mediate an end to the United States and Israel’s war on
Quote: Iran.
Sarah: Iran’s Foreign Ministry said Sunday that Field Marshal Asim Munir is heading to Tehran Monday.
Sarah: He’s Pakistan’s Chief of Army Staff and Chief of Defence Forces, and it’s his third visit to Iran this year.
Rich: Third trip. Two calls with Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi in four days.
Rich: Islamabad is putting serious senior-level effort into this—so what can Munir actually offer Tehran that Pakistan’s first two visits
Rich: couldn’t?
Sarah: Pakistan’s Asim Munir is back in Tehran trying to restart the stalled U.S.-Iran channel.
Sarah: But the MoU has lapsed, and Tehran’s public conditions for reopening Hormuz are still a concrete barrier.
Sarah: We don’t yet know Munir’s mandate on any of them.
Rich: Pakistan is not running a charity shuttle service between capitals.
Rich: If it’s becoming one of the war’s main mediators
Rich: there has to be something tangible in it for Islamabad—energy access
Rich: debt relief or diplomatic leverage.
Sarah: SOFX, with Mark Richardson:
Quote: Pentagon casualty data reviewed Thursday list 757 U.S.
Quote: service members wounded and 18 dead since the war with Iran began Feb. 28.
Quote: The 60-person one-day increase came without dates or incident details, and the military tracks the toll in two separate casualty categories.
Rich: Sixty more wounded in one Pentagon update—from 697 to 757—and DCAS gives the public no date, base, or incident.
Rich: Eighteen Americans are dead, and apparently an explanation for a jump that size is optional.
Sarah: As of Thursday’s review, the confirmed Defense Casualty Analysis System total was 757 wounded and 18 dead since February 28.
Sarah: We still don’t know when those 60 injuries occurred or what caused them; the Pentagon did not provide that detail to Stars and Stripes.
Rich: And they’ve split the ledger between Operation Epic Fury and the catch-all label, Overseas Operations.
Rich: Reorganizing a database doesn’t make the people in it any less wounded.
Sarah: The administration treats July 7 as renewed hostilities and the start of a new War Powers clock; some lawmakers say the fighting never truly
Sarah: stopped. How casualties are categorized now feeds that dispute, and the record needs a fuller accounting.
Sarah: This one's from France 24:
Quote: The United States on Thursday warned allies and China to join President Donald Trump' s new campaign to isolate the Iranian economy
Quote: vowing that Washington would "collapse this regime" in Tehran.
Quote: Iran branded the US threats as "economic terrorism" and said they would fail.
Sarah: France 24 reports that Washington has told allies and China to join its economic-isolation campaign
Sarah: while President Trump says it will “collapse” Iran’s regime.
Sarah: Tehran has called it economic terrorism, and the measures themselves were still undefined in Friday’s report.
Rich: And China is the point.
Rich: You can threaten all the friendly capitals you want
Rich: but if Beijing keeps a commercial channel open
Rich: this becomes a very expensive slogan with a leak in the side.
Sarah: Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said more details would come at a Monday press conference—today.
Sarah: As Islamabad tries to reopen a diplomatic channel, Washington is pushing isolation.
Sarah: Those are competing bets.
Rich: The threat of “economic oblivion” for “any remaining tie” to Tehran reaches well beyond Iran.
Rich: Washington is asking partners to absorb retaliation, trade losses, and political heat right as this war reaches six months.
Sarah: Here's Al Jazeera:
Quote: Since the United States and Israel launched their war on Iran six months ago
Quote: petrol prices have risen in at least 145 countries
Quote: adding to the burden on consumers worldwide.
Quote: The figures are based on data from GlobalPetrolPrices, which tracks fuel prices in 170 countries and territories.
Rich: One hundred forty-five of 170 countries are paying more at the pump.
Rich: Al Jazeera’s GlobalPetrolPrices data puts the U.S.
Rich: increase at 39 percent—$2.94 a gallon before the war, $4.09 now.
Rich: That’s the cost the sanctions coalition is being asked to absorb.
Sarah: The dataset is broad
Sarah: but read it carefully: it tracks price changes since the war began; it doesn’t assign every country’s increase to a single cause.
Sarah: Still, six months on, the consumer impact is measurable across 145 countries.
Rich: Myanmar is up 56 percent.
Rich: The UAE, an oil producer, is up 50 percent.
Rich: In the U.S., fifty bucks of gas now gets a family sedan about 113 fewer miles than it did before the fighting.
Rich: People can argue strategy in capitals; drivers are getting the invoice.
Sarah: Fuel costs ripple beyond the forecourt—through fertiliser, trucking, and shipping.
Sarah: That’s why this country-by-country snapshot matters alongside the military and diplomatic developments we’ve already covered.
Sarah: Stars and Stripes, with Lara Korte:
Quote: Nearly six months after the U.S.
Quote: Navy evacuated 1,300 family members from Bahrain at the start of the Iran war
Quote: officials are saying the evacuees cannot return for the foreseeable future and should find new homes elsewhere.
Sarah: Six months after 1,300 Navy family members were evacuated
Sarah: NAVCENT has told them not to plan on returning to Bahrain and to choose new permanent duty stations
Sarah: Stars and Stripes reports. Vice Adm.
Sarah: Curt Renshaw’s description—“making this up as we go”—is an admission that the support system has gone beyond what it was built to handle.
Rich: And families are the ones carrying that failure: tens of thousands out of pocket
Rich: sleeping on temporary-housing floors
Rich: with cars and furniture stranded in Bahrain or on ships that can’t leave.
Rich: The 180-day benefits clock is a bureaucratic deadline; displacement doesn’t stop because a form says six months.
Sarah: The Bahrain evacuation has become a long-term relocation, reshaping families’ lives while the Navy’s regional posture remains unsettled.
Rich: Every Gulf capital watching NAVCENT just got the same signal: Bahrain’s family footprint has become a long-term problem
Rich: and Washington is publicly improvising how to pay for it.
Host: If today’s briefing was useful, please subscribe or leave a review wherever you’re listening.
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Host: We’re watching for news from Asim Munir’s talks with senior Iranian officials in Tehran
Host: and for Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s Monday press conference
Host: where he’s expected to give more details on the planned Iran sanctions package.
Host: Links to every story are in the show notes, so you can read up on whichever developments caught your attention.
Host: That’s Iran War Daily for today.
Host: This is a Lantern Podcast.