Meeting of top military, civilian leaders is being held after Pakistan’s retaliatory strikes on armed groups in Iran.
Pakistan’s top military and civilian leaders are to conduct a national security review over the standoff with Iran after the neighbouring countries targeted each other with missile strikes that have raised fears of further instability across the region.
Caretaker Prime Minister Anwaar-ul-Haq Kakar called the meeting on Friday, a day after the nuclear-armed nation launched strikes on the hideouts of armed groups in Iran’s Sistan-Baluchestan province, killing at least nine people.
Pakistan’s retaliatory action followed Iran’s air raids against the armed group Jaish al-Adl in Pakistan’s southwestern border province of Balochistan, in which two people died.
A security official said the chief of army staff and head of the intelligence services will attend the meeting, the AFP news agency reported.
Kakar cut short his visit to the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland following the attack.
The tit-for-tat strikes have been the largest cross-border intrusions in recent years and have raised alarm about wider instability in the Middle East since the war between Israel and Hamas erupted on October 7.
However, both Pakistan and Iran have signalled a desire to calm tensions.
Iran’s foreign ministry said on Thursday that it was committed to good neighbourly relations with Pakistan, but called on Islamabad to prevent the establishment of “terrorist bases” on its soil.
Pakistan issued a similar statement, with its foreign ministry saying that its “sole” reason for the retaliatory attacks was “in pursuit of Pakistan’s own security and national interest, which is paramount and cannot be compromised”.
China, a close ally of both Pakistan and Iran, said it was willing to mediate.
United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres urged the two countries to “exercise maximum restraint to avoid a further escalation of tensions”.
Guterres “underlines that all security concerns between the two countries must be addressed by peaceful means, through dialogue and cooperation, in accordance with the principles of sovereignty, territorial integrity and good neighbourly relations,” said UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric.
