While Iran’s attack on Pakistan is their internal matter, India is watching the situation closely, said top intelligence sources. Meanwhile, Pakistan’s top military brass is holding a meeting at the General Headquarters (GHQ) to look at how to respond to the attack.
Pakistan on Wednesday condemned Iran for launching airstrikes the previous day that Tehran claimed targeted bases for a militant Sunni separatist group. Islamabad angrily denounced the attack as a “blatant violation" of its airspace and said it killed two children.
“This action by Iran is their internal matter…This, however, proves Pakistan is a terror state and even the Muslim world has started attacking them now…Pakistan is safe haven for terrorists after Taliban. Iran is after them to act otherwise they will be forced to take action," intelligence sources said.
THE STRIKE
Tuesday’s strike in Pakistan’s restive southwestern Baluchistan province imperiled diplomatic relations between the two neighbors — Iran and nuclear-armed Pakistan have long regarded each other with suspicion over militant attacks. However, both sides appeared wary of provoking the other.
The attack also threatened to further ignite violence in a Middle-East unsettled by Israel’s ongoing war on Hamas in the Gaza Strip. Iran launched strikes late Monday in Iraq and Syria over an Islamic State-claimed suicide bombing that killed over 90 people earlier this month.
In state media reports, which were later withdrawn without explanation, Iran said its paramilitary Revolutionary Guard targeted bases for the militant group, Jaish al-Adl, or the ‘Army of Justice’. The group, which seeks an independent Balochistan and has spread across Afghanistan, Iran and Pakistan, acknowledged the assault in a statement shared online.
Six bomb-carrying drones and rockets struck homes that the militants claim housed children and wives of their fighters. Jaish al-Adl said the attack killed two children and wounded two women and a teenage girl.
Videos purportedly from the site, shared by the Baluch activist group HalVash, showed a burning building and two charred, small corpses.
Pakistan’s Foreign Ministry said it issued a strong protest late Tuesday with Iran’s Foreign Ministry, and summoned an Iranian diplomat in Islamabad “to convey our strongest condemnation of this blatant violation of Pakistan’s sovereignty."
“The responsibility for the consequences will lie squarely with Iran," it said.
A senior Pakistani security official, speaking to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity, said Iran had shared no information prior to the strike. He said Pakistan reserved the right to respond at a time and place of the country’s choosing and such a strike would be measured and in line with public expectations. “The dangerous precedent set by Iran is destabilising and has reciprocal implications," the official said.
With AP Inputs
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