Pakistan strikes inside Iran: Intelligence official

Pakistan has conducted strikes inside Iran targeting Baluchi militants, a senior intelligence official says, two days after Iran conducted strikes inside Pakistani territory.

There was no official confirmation of the strikes by Pakistani officials, but Iranian media said several missiles hit a village in the Sistan-Baluchistan province that borders Pakistan and that three women and four children, all non-Iranians, were killed.

Iran said on Tuesday it had targeted Israel-linked militant bases inside Pakistan.

Pakistan said civilians had been hit and two children killed, warning that there would be consequences for which Tehran would be responsible.

It comes after Pakistan recalled its ambassador from Iran to protest a “blatant breach” of its sovereignty after Tehran said it launched missile attacks on militant bases in southwestern Pakistan.

Iran’s foreign minister said it hit militants in “missile and drone” strikes.

State media said Iranian missiles struck two bases of the Sunni Muslim group Jaish al-Adl, designated a “foreign terrorist organisation” by the United States State Department.

Nuclear-armed Pakistan said a violation of its airspace resulted in the deaths of two children but has not confirmed the nature of the violation, or the location of the strikes.

Only militants were hit, Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian said in Davos, Switzerland, where he was attending the World Economic Forum, alleging those attacked were linked to Israel.

Pakistan and Iran have in the past had rocky relations, but the strikes are the highest-profile cross-border intrusion in recent years.

The strikes were launched a day after similar attacks carried out by Tehran inside other neighbours, Iraq and Syria.

Baghdad recalled its ambassador from Tehran after Iran’s state-backed media said it had hit an Israeli espionage centre.

Provincial officials in Pakistan said two children were killed and several others injured in strikes near the Iran border.

The violation was unprovoked and unacceptable, said Pakistani foreign ministry spokeswoman Mumtaz Zahra Baloch.

Pakistan reserved “the right to respond to this illegal act”, a message it had conveyed to the Iranian government, she said.

Pakistan would not allow Iran’s ambassador, currently visiting his home country, to return, Baloch said.

A joint border trade committee meeting had been cancelled, and a Pakistani trade delegation had been recalled from Chabahar in Iran, government official Aurangzeb Badini said.

“Further escalation is possible, though Islamabad has strong incentives to be cautious,” said Michael Kugelman, director of the Wilson Center’s South Asia Institute, adding that Beijing might also step in to help mediate.

“China has close ties to both Iran and Pakistan, and it has a strong interest in the crisis not spiralling out of control ...it will likely quietly press the two sides to step back from the brink,” he said.

Jaish al-Adl has in the past mounted attacks on Iranian security forces in the border area with Pakistan.

Officials in Pakistan’s southwestern province of Balochistan, which borders Iran, said that four missiles had hit the Panjgur district close to the border.

“Four missiles were fired in the village of Koh-i-Sabaz which is around 50 m inside Pakistan soil,” a senior official of the Panjgur administration told Reuters.

“A mosque and three houses were damaged in the attack,” another official said, adding that two young girls were killed and three other people injured.