Iran | Pakistan

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi told his European counterparts on Friday that they have no grounds for reactivating UN sanctions after they threatened to do so in the coming months unless there is progress in nuclear talks. “If EU/E3 want to have a role, they should act responsibly and put aside the worn-out policies of threat and pressure, including the ‘snap-back’ for which they (have) absolutely no moral (or) legal grounds,” Araghchi said on X. He added that “any new round of talks is only possible when the other side is ready for a fair, balanced, and mutually beneficial nuclear deal.” The remarks came after Araghchi held a conference call with his British, French and German counterparts and European Union foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas. The European diplomats told Araghchi of “their determination to use the ‘snapback’ mechanism — which allows for the reimposition of all international sanctions against Iran — in the absence of concrete progress” towards a new deal on Iran’s nuclear programme “by...

Pakistan on Wednesday stressed that Iran’s envoy in Islamabad, Reza Amiri Moghadam, was “widely respected” after the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) added him to its Most Wanted list for his alleged role in the 2007 disappearance and suspected abduction of retired FBI agent Robert A. “Bob” Levinson. “As far as Pakistan is concerned, the ambassador of Iran is widely respected for his role in the promotion of Pakistan-Iran relations,” FO spokesperson Shafqat Ali Khan told Dawn.com in response to a request for comment on the matter. “He is entitled to all the privileges, immunities and respect due to [being an] ambassador, that too, from a friendly neighbouring country,” Shafqat highlighted. Levinson arrived on Iran’s Kish Island on March 8, 2007 and went missing the following day. Notably, a 2013 Associated Press (AP) investigation revealed that Levinson had been sent on a spy mission by Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) analysts who had no authority to run such an operation. Levinson’s fami...

Federal Minister for Religious Affairs, Sardar Muhammad Yousaf, has revealed that nearly 40,000 Pakistani pilgrims who traveled to Iran, Iraq, and Syria are either missing or have overstayed, with no official record of their whereabouts.

Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar on Tuesday slammed last month’s attacks by Israel and the United States on Iran as “unacceptable” as he attended a ministerial meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) in China’s Tianjin. The SCO is a 10-nation Eurasian security and political grouping whose members include China, Russia, Pakistan, India, and Iran. The group’s foreign ministers meet as a precursor to the annual summit of its leaders, which will be hosted by China this autumn in Tianjin. On June 13, Israel launched an unprecedented bombing campaign on Iran that targeted military and nuclear sites as well as residential areas, and killed senior military commanders, nuclear scientists and civilians. The attacks began days before a planned meeting between Tehran and Washington aimed at reviving nuclear negotiations. The US, which had been in talks with Iran since April 12, joined Israel in carrying out its own strikes on June 22, targeting Iranian nuclear sites at Fordow, Isfahan and Natanz. Iranian authori...

Federal Minister for Interior Mohsin Naqvi arrived in Mashhad as part of his official visit to Iran.

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian has reaffirmed Iran’s deep commitment to strengthening relations with Pakistan, highlighting the importance of unity among Muslim nations and appreciation for Pakistan's past support.

ISLAMABAD - In a significant diplomatic development, the interior ministers of Pakistan, Iran, and Iraq convened in Tehran for a landmark trilateral conference aimed at enhancing facilitation for religious pilgrims traveling between the three countries.

Iran said on Monday there would be no new nuclear talks with the United States if they were conditioned on Tehran abandoning its uranium enrichment activities. Washington and Tehran had been engaged in several rounds of negotiations seeking to strike a deal on the Islamic Republic’s nuclear programme, but Israel derailed the talks when it […]

Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi on Monday announced that he and his counterparts in and Iran and Iraq will form a trilateral working group to prevent illegal migration under the guise of pilgrimage, Radio Pakistan reported. Earlier this month, the government, during a meeting, decided that under the new measures, the traditional Salar System for zaireen (pilgrims) will be abolished and replaced with a zaireen group organisers model. From 2026 onwards, pilgrims will only be allowed to travel under registered organisers. Speaking at a trilateral conference of the interior ministers of Pakistan, Iran, and Iraq in Tehran, Naqvi told journalists the conference agreed to take all possible measures to facilitate zaireen travelling to Iran and Iraq. View this post on Instagram “We had a great and good discussion,” Naqvi said. “We will have a joint working group between the three countries so we can have better coordination. “The most important thing to acknowledge is that there are several million people who go to Ira...

Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi reaffirmed Pakistan’s strong condemnation of the recent attack on Iran, expressing full support for Tehran’s right to defend itself.

Federal Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi arrived in Iran on an official visit, where he was warmly received at Imam Khomeini International Airport by Iranian Interior Minister Eskandar Momeni.

QUETTA: Iran Air plans to launch direct weekly passenger and cargo flights from Quetta to the Iranian cities of Zahidan and Mashhad in a move aimed at boosting trade and travel between the neighbouring countries, an Iranian diplomat announced on Saturday. The new air service will help facilitate commerce, reduce travel time and costs for traders, and strengthen bilateral ties, said Ali Reza Rajai, Iran’s acting consul general in Quetta. The announcement was made at a ceremony organised by the Pak-Iran Joint Chamber of Commerce. The flights are intended “to facilitate trade and travel between Pakistan and Iran,” Rajai said, stressing the need for stronger cooperation. Top officials from the airline, including Iran Air Chief Agha Karimi and Deputy Chief Agha Ismail, were also in attendance. Mr Rajai said the new service would be critical for enhancing port-to-port cooperation between Pakistan’s Gwadar Port and Iran’s Chabahar Port. He called for bureaucratic hurdles to be removed to improve bilateral business, ...

A United Kingdom parliamentary committee on Thursday blamed Iran for at least 15 attempts to kill or kidnap British-based individuals since 2022, saying the threat from Iran had “significantly increased”. London’s response has been too focused on “crisis management”, said parliament’s intelligence and security committee, with concerns over Iran’s nuclear programme dominating their attention too much. Tehran swiftly issued a “categorical rejection of the unfounded, politically motivated and hostile allegations”. The committee’s claims were “baseless, irresponsible, and reflective of a broader pattern of distortion intended to malign Iran’s legitimate regional and national interests”, said its London embassy. The report comes after growing alarm in Britain at alleged Iranian targeting of dissidents, media organisations and journalists in the UK, including accusations of physical attacks. Iran in March became the first country to be placed on an enhanced tier of the Foreign Influence Registration Scheme, which a...

Iran’s foreign minister has held talks with Saudi Arabia’s de facto leader, the Saudi foreign ministry said, two weeks after a ceasefire between regional rivals Iran and Israel began. Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman said his country hoped the truce would contribute to regional stability, and emphasised Riyadh’s position “in supporting dialogue through diplomatic means as a path to resolving disputes,” the ministry said in a post on X early on Wednesday. According to the Saudi ministry, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi “expressed his gratitude” to Riyadh for its condemnation of Israel’s attacks on Iran last month. Israel launched its unprecedented bombing campaign on Iran on June 13, targeting military and nuclear facilities as well as residential areas. The strikes killed more than 1,000 people in Iran, including senior military commanders and nuclear scientists, according to Tehran. Israel, in turn, was hit by waves of drone and missile fire from Iran, which Israeli authorities said left at lea...

Iran said on Tuesday it has not made any request for talks with the United States, after President Donald Trump said Tehran was seeking negotiations following last month’s war with Israel. “No request for a meeting has been made on our side to the American side,” said Iranian foreign ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baqaei, according to Tasnim news agency. Trump said on Monday that Iran was seeking talks with the US and that they had been scheduled, without specifying the time or the location. “We have scheduled Iran talks. They want to talk,” Trump told reporters in the White House, where he was meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. “They want to meet. They want to work something out. They’re very different now than they were two weeks ago.” Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi also reiterated Tehran’s position, rejecting talks at this stage. “Although Iran has in recent days received messages indicating that the US may be ready to return to negotiations, how can we trust further engagement...

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said in an interview released on Monday that his country has “no problem” restarting nuclear talks with the United States, provided that trust can be reestablished between Washington and Tehran, and also accused Israel of attempting to assassinate him. The remarks, made during an interview with US journalist and former Trump confidante Tucker Carlson, came less than a month after Israel launched an unprecedented bombing campaign on June 13 against Iran and the US struck the Islamic republic’s nuclear facilities. The attacks took place days before Tehran and Washington were set to meet for a new round of nuclear talks, stalling negotiations that were aimed at reaching a deal over Iran’s atomic programme. “We see no problem in re-entering the negotiations,” the Iranian president said. “There is a condition … for restarting the talks. How are we going to trust the US again? “We re-entered the negotiations, then how can we know for sure that in the middle of the talks, the Isra...

Brics leaders at a summit on Sunday took aim at US President Donald Trump’s “indiscriminate” import tariffs and recent Israeli-US strikes on Iran. The 11 emerging nations — including Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa — account for about half the world’s population and 40 per cent of global economic output. The bloc is divided about much, but found common cause when it comes to the mercurial US leader and his stop-start tariff wars — even if it avoided naming him directly. Voicing “serious concerns about the rise of unilateral tariff” measures, Brics members said the tariffs risked hurting the global economy, according to a summit joint statement. Trump fired back at the bloc directly on social media on Sunday night. “Any country aligning themselves with the Anti-American policies of Brics will be charged an additional 10 per cent Tariff. There will be no exceptions to this policy,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform. Earlier, Brics also offered symbolic backing to fellow member Iran, condemn...

UNICEF calls Afghan return an emergency, with 1.4M returning from Iran, Pakistan amid chronic returnee crisis

The federal government has decided to enhance travel facilities for pilgrims heading to Iran and Iraq by increasing the number of flights and introducing a ferry service.

Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz has said the army must draw up a plan to prevent Iran from threatening Israel again after the arch-foes fought a 12-day war last month, in comments released on Friday. “The Israeli military’s current mission is to prepare an enforcement plan to ensure that Iran cannot threaten Israel again,” Katz said at a meeting with military leaders on Thursday, according to a statement released by his ministry. “The army must prepare on the intelligence and operational level to ensure that the air force maintains air superiority over Tehran, the ability to enforce restrictions on Iran and prevent it from rebuilding its capabilities,” he added. Israel launched a bombing campaign against Iran on June 13 following a decades-long shadow war, saying it aimed to prevent it from developing a nuclear weapon — an ambition Tehran has consistently denied — and degrade its ballistic missile arsenal. Following a US-announced ceasefire, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to prevent Iran...