US President Donald Trump said on April 20 that he now considers the Iran ceasefire to expire on Wednesday evening Washington time — April 23 — and that a further extension is “highly unlikely,” sharpening what had until now been a deliberately ambiguous stance.
Speaking in a telephone interview with Bloomberg, Trump said it was “highly unlikely that I’d extend it,” adding: “I’m not going to be rushed into making a bad deal. We’ve got all the time in the world.” Asked whether fighting would resume in the absence of an agreement, he replied: “If there’s no deal, I would certainly expect.”
The ceasefire began on the evening of April 7 and was initially set to last two weeks. In earlier press appearances, Trump had given contradictory answers on whether an extension was possible — including, in one session, five different responses to the same question.
In a separate Truth Social post, Trump wrote that “Israel never talked me into the war with Iran” and declared that “IRAN CAN NEVER HAVE A NUCLEAR WEAPON.” He also mentioned “regime change” and said the “results in Iran will be amazing.”
For Sri Lanka, the concrete Wednesday-evening deadline returns Strait of Hormuz closure risk to the foreground. Roughly a fifth of the world’s seaborne oil moves through the strait, and any renewed Iranian disruption would threaten Sri Lanka’s fuel-import schedule and pricing — as it did during earlier phases of the conflict.
Trump’s remarks supersede his April 18 warning that attacks could resume after the ceasefire expired without a specific date attached.
