ISLAMABAD — Pakistan recalled its ambassador to Tehran on Wednesday, a day after Iran conducted airstrikes inside Pakistan that it claimed targeted bases for a militant Sunni separatist group.
Islamabad denounced the attack as a “blatant violation” of its airspace and said it killed two children.
Tuesday’s airstrikes in Pakistan’s restive southwestern Baluchistan province imperiled diplomatic relations between the two neighbors, but both sides appeared wary of provoking the other. Iran and nuclear-armed Pakistan have long regarded each other with suspicion over militant attacks.
The attack raised the threat of violence spreading in a Middle East unsettled by Israel’s war with Hamas in the Gaza Strip. Iran also staged airstrikes late Monday in Iraq and Syria over an Islamic State-claimed suicide bombing that killed over 90 people earlier this month. Iraq recalled its ambassador from Iran for consultations.
Mumtaz Zahra Baloch, the spokesperson for Pakistan’s Foreign Ministry, announced that Islamabad was recalling its ambassador to Iran over the strikes.
“Last night’s unprovoked and blatant breach of Pakistan’s sovereignty by Iran is a violation of international law and the purposes and principles of the charter of the United Nations,” she said in a televised address.
Baloch added that Pakistan asked the Iranian ambassador, who was visiting Tehran, not to return.
Iran did not immediately acknowledge Pakistan’s decision.
Iranian state media reports, which were later withdrawn without explanation, said the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard targeted bases in Pakistan belonging to the militant group Jaish al-Adl, or the “Army of Justice.”
Iran’s defense minister also said Wednesday that Iran would respond to any threats against itself, the official IRNA news agency reported.
Without naming any country, Gen. Mohammad Reza Ashtiani said: “We will show reaction to threat against the Islamic Republic of Iran from any region. The reaction will be corresponding, harsh and strong.”
Jaish al-Adl, which seeks an independent Baluchistan for ethnic Baluch areas in 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.
A Pakistani intelligence report said the two children killed were a 6-year-old girl and an 11-month-old boy.