Islamabad quickly downplayed the report that Iran has fired mortar shells into Pakistan’s Baluchistan Province, at a time when Pakistan is locked in border clashes with its archrival India.
Iranian border guards reportedly fired three mortar shells into Baluchistan’s remote Pangur District on Thursday, hours after India claimed it had carried out “surgical strikes” on the Pakistani part of the disputed Kashmir valley.
“It was just a coincidence that this happened on the same day that India violated the ceasefire across the Line of Control [de facto border that divides Kashmir between Pakistan and India]. Otherwise there is no comparison between the two incidents,” a Pakistani Foreign Office official, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Anadolu Agency. “Pakistan and Iran are brotherly countries and have no border or any other disputes.”
The shelling follows the visit of an Iranian naval ship that arrived in Pakistan’s port city of Karachi last Wednesday to take part in a joint exercise between the two naval forces. Iran, which shares a 900-kilometer border with Pakistan, and fires mortars into the mineral-rich Baluchistan province mainly during clashes between Iranian border guards and militant groups as well as at drug smugglers.
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