Analyst gives upbeat view about Pakistan Army Chief’s Iran visit

Tehran, IRNA – Last week visit of Pakistan's Chief of the Army Staff General Qamar Javed Bajwa to Iran is important for bilateral relations and to pave the way for military cooperation between Iran and Pakistan, said Mostafa Zandieh an Iranian senior analyst for South Asia affairs.

Relations between Iran and Pakistan in political, economic, defense and security fields are growing at a rapid pace and that will help remove misunderstandings if any in the bilateral relations.

The visit of Pakistan's senior military official to the Islamic Republic of Iran shows the plot of regional and transregional states for creating division between two friendly and brotherly countries has failed.

This is the second official visit of General Bajwa to Iran.

Heading a high-ranking military delegation, he paid a visit to the capital city of Tehran in November 2017 and met with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani and Iran's top commanders as well as Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif.

General Bajwa held talks with President Rouhani, Zarif, Chief of Staff of the Iranian Armed Forces Major General Mohammad Hossein Baqeri, Army Commander Major General Abdolrahim Mousavi along with Secretary of the Supreme National Security Council Ali Shamkhani.

In an interview with IRNA, Iranian senior analyst for South Asia affairsو Mostafa Zandieh said that General Bajwa has prioritized reducing regional tensions, particularly combating sectarianism.

He said that the visit of General Bajwa to Iran was in line with a plan for cooperation on defense as well as security areas.

He said that the regional situation of Afghanistan and Daesh (ISIS) that are considered as a threat to both Iran and Pakistan has been on the agenda of talks between the Iranian and Pakistani the top commanders.

Definitely the visit was a positive development, Zandieh added.

“There is no doubt about that any sort of visits by senior people especially the military commanders is very helpful in bringing solidarity among Muslim countries and between Iran and Pakistan,”.

“The border between Iran and Pakistan needs to be protected and we have to see that both countries cooperate to the maximum level so that militants who sometimes cross the border and disturb the peace, drug traffickers and others who have been damaging the interest of the two countries are prevented from doing so,” said the analyst.

Iran, Pakistan Explore Defence & Development Ties

If all goes well and if the July 25 elections in would produce a strong, stable, and truly independent government in Islamabad, then prospects are bright for Iran-Pakistan ties – countries which before the infiltration of the heretical Wahhabis in southern Asia, had enjoyed the best of good-neighbourly relations. The recent visit to Pakistan of the Chief of Staff of the Iranian Armed Forces, Major-General Mohammad Hussein Baqeri, who held constructive talks with his hosts, including the joint production of defence equipment, and was taken on tour of the sensitive Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Province on the terrorist-infested borders of American-occupied Afghanistan, indicates the will of the two sides to forge closer relations for confronting common threats.

 Baqeri, invited by his Pakistani counterpart, General Qamar Javed Bajwa, who last year had officially visited the Islamic Republic of Iran, in his meetings with both senior military and civilian officials of the care-taker government, discussed wide range of cooperation for promotion of bilateral ties, including coordination at the 700-km long joint porous border, which terrorists on the payroll of the Unholy Trinity (US-Saudi Arabia-Israel) take advantage of to attack the people of Iran’s Sistan-Baluchestan Province. Topics discussed by the two sides ranged from military education, pilot training, military drills and regular contacts between the two countries’ defence industries, to the threats posed by common enemies. It is obvious that the US and the illegal Zionist entity are the archenemies of both Iran and Pakistan (and also of the whole Muslim World), a factor to which General Baqeri referred last Monday in Pakistan, saying: "The US tops the list of countries that seek to create insecurity in the region and is against the restoration of regional peace.” This is clear by the various terrorist outfits Washington supports in the region in coordination with regime in Riyadh, to create divisions amongst neighbours – a reality which Islamabad should realize rather than being deceived by the tens of millions of dollars that Saudi Arabia regularly pours in with the intention of keeping Pakistan in perpetual turmoil.

 Right now, besides its threats and pressure tactics to deter Pakistan – as well as India – from expanding ties with Iran, the US, which is an outside power, is airlifting into Afghanistan from Syria and Iraq the defeated Daesh terrorists, who might soon infiltrate Pakistan as well, and cross its eastern frontiers into Indian-controlled Kashmir. In view of these dangers there is a real need to confront the mischief of the US and its agents – as was evident by the recent meetings held in Islamabad between intelligence officials of Iran, Pakistan, Russia and China.


 The sooner the regional countries (India included) become aware of the devilish designs of the Americans the better for the peace, progress and security of Asia. We know Pakistan does not like the lingering presence in Afghanistan of the US occupation forces, although it thinks it is not in a position to voice public opposition. As for the proud Muslim Afghan people, it is actually a humiliation for them to continue to tolerate the presence of US and NATO occupation troops on their soil that has destabilized their country, resulting in proliferation of poppy cultivation and terrorism. 


The Islamic Republic of Iran has long shown the way to the world on how to keep out the devilish US, and if regional countries, including Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, Qatar, and others, were to follow suit with firm faith in God Almighty for the sake of Islamic unity, there is no reason why the Americans cannot be kicked out from all of South and West Asia. Iran can help establish and train popular mobilization units in both Afghanistan and Pakistan for weeding out terrorists and terrorism, as it successfully did in Syria and Iraq. Let us hope, the exchange of visits at the top levels will continue to take place amongst regional countries and that Pakistan will emerge stronger from next week’s general elections. If serious cooperation, not just in defence but in all fields, starts between the two neighbours, it will be an economic boon for both the Iranian and Pakistani peoples.

  -Kayhan Int’l