Srinagar- Amid rising hostilities rippling through the region, Pakistan on Thursday carried out unprecedented missile strikes inside Iran in response to an earlier Iranian strike on a terrorist hideout in its Baluchistan province.
The tensions between two Muslim countries escalated at a time when Iran’s allies, so called Axis of Resistance- have stepped up attacks on Israeli forces and its allies across the Middle East against the backdrop of the war in Gaza.
Iran also staged airstrikes late Monday in Iraq and Syria over an Islamic State-claimed suicide bombing that killed over 90 people in early January and attack inside Pakistan was in response to killing of 11 policemen by Jash-al-Adl operating out of Pakistan.
On Tuesday Iran hit what it called Jash-al-Adl hideout inside Pakistan prompting angry reaction and today’s retaliation from Pakistan.
Pakistan’s military described using “killer drones, rockets, loitering munitions and standoff weapons” in the attack. Standoff weapons are missiles fired from aircraft at a distance — likely meaning Pakistan’s fighter jets didn’t enter Iranian airspace. It said the targets were bases used by the Baloch Liberation Front (BLF) and the associated Baloch Liberation Army.
In Islamabad, a foreign ministry spokesperson said Pakistan’s caretaker Prime Minister Anwaar-ul-haq Kakar would cut short a visit to the World Economic Forum in Davos and return home.
A day before, Iran conducted an airstrike in Baluchistan Province in Pakistan. The Iranian government later said that the strike in Pakistan, as well as attacks it conducted this week in Iraq and Syria, showed that Iran would hit back forcefully at enemies anywhere.
An emboldened Iran has been using its allied forces against Israel and its allies since the war in Gaza began in October after the Hamas-led attacks on Israel.
Pakistan denounced the Iranian strike as a blatant violation of international law and warned on Wednesday that it “reserves the right to respond.”
Reacting to the strikes Iran summoned Pakistan’s chargé d’affaires demanding Islamabad’s “immediate explanation” about the attack.
Pakistan, which is grappling with political and economic troubles, indicated on Thursday that it did not want further escalation in its clash with Iran. In a statement, the Pakistani military called the two neighbors “brotherly countries” and said that “dialogue and cooperation is deemed prudent in resolving bilateral issues” between them.
In carefully crafted statements issued on Thursday, Pakistani officials refrained from directly accusing Iran. Pakistan’s narrative mirrored Iran’s rationale for its own strikes, saying that the Pakistani actions similarly targeted only those separatists who had taken refuge across the border.
After Iran’s strike in Pakistan, Iranian officials said that the attack had been aimed at terrorists who threatened Iran, but the Pakistani authorities rejected that account, citing what they said were civilian casualties from the strike.
Pakistan’s comments after its retaliatory strikes signal a desire to keep the row contained, but analysts warned it could get out of hand.”Iran’s motivation for attacking Pakistan remains opaque but in light of broader Iranian behaviour in the region it can escalate,” Asfandyar Mir, a senior expert on South Asia security at the U.S. Institute of Peace, told Reuters.
“What will cause anxiety in Tehran is that Pakistan has crossed a line by hitting inside Iranian territory, a threshold that even the U.S. and Israel have been careful to not breach.”
Russia’s foreign ministry on Thursday called on Iran and Pakistan to show maximum restraint and solve their differences through diplomacy.
Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said after speaking with his counterparts from both countries that neither side wanted to escalate tensions.
IRAN PAK RELATIONS
Iran and Pakistan have complicated but cordial relations. Their ministers met at Davos this week and their navies conducted joint exercises in the Strait of Hormuz and the Gulf. The two countries have similar concerns about the lawless border area, where drug smugglers and militant Baloch groups are very active.
After both sets of air strikes, each side seemed anxious to emphasise that these did not represent attacks on a brotherly neighbour.
Tehran’s reaction to the Pakistani strike appears relatively muted and the authorities have said that the victims, who included women and children, were not Iranian nationals.
Michael Kugelman, South Asia director at the Wilson Center, said that while Pakistan’s retaliation raises the risk of escalation, “it also provides an opportunity to step back from the brink”.”In effect, the two sides are even now.
Islamabad had a strong incentive to try to restore deterrence, especially with Iran on the offensive around the wider region deploying direct strikes and proxies to hit out at threats and rivals.
In effect, if Pakistan had held back, it would have faced the risk of additional strikes,” he said. Others suggested that the government in Islamabad was under domestic pressure to respond. The country, which saw its former leader Imran Khan removed nearly two years ago, is holding an election next month.
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