New Delhi: A day after Iran carried out a missile strike in Pakistan, India on Wednesday (January 17) seemingly justified the action, citing the necessity for countries to act in their “self-defence”.

Iran’s semi-official Tasnim news agency had reported on Tuesday evening that Iran had targeted strongholds of the Jaish al-Adl in Pakistan’s Balochistan province with a “combination of missile and drone attacks”.

Pakistan foreign office had first issued a statement that two children were killed and three girls injured in the “unprovoked violation of its airspace by Iran”.

Later on Wednesday afternoon, Pakistan recalled its ambassador to Tehran and informed the Iranian envoy, who was not in the country, that he should not return to his posting.

In a late-night reaction on Wednesday, the Indian external affairs ministry spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said it was understandable if a country took measures to defend its security.

“This is a matter between Iran and Pakistan. Insofar as India is concerned, we have an uncompromising position of zero tolerance towards terrorism. We understand actions that countries take in their self-defence,” he said.

India's backing of the Iranian action was expected, given that New Delhi had publicly undertaken cross-border operations at least twice, purportedly targeting terrorist camps, in the last ten years.

The first instance involved missile strikes in 2016, and the second included airstrikes in 2019.

In response to the latter, Pakistan had retaliated by conducting air raids on military installations across the border.

Iran’s foreign minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian claimed that the target of this week’s missile strike was the Jaish al-Adl terror group that had “taken shelter in some parts of Pakistan’s Balochistan province”.

Jaish al-Adl, formerly known as Jundallah, had also been designated as a terror group by the US state department in 2010. It is considered as the “most active and influential” Sunni militant group operating in the Iran-Pakistan border.

Speaking on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Amir-Abdollahian said that Iran respected the territorial integrity of Pakistan but would not “allow the country’s [Iran’s] national security to be compromised or played with”.

He also added that “none of the nationals of the friendly and brotherly country of Pakistan were targeted by Iranian missiles and drones”.

Over the years, Iranian officials have often threatened to conduct military raids into Pakistan after any major action by Jaish al-Adl. In 2014, Pakistan had to make it publicly clear that Iranian security forces were not allowed to conduct operations inside its territory.

This is the first time that Iran may have sent missiles into Pakistan, but Iranian security forces may have intruded beyond the border once before.

In 2021, Iran’s Revolutionary Guard had announced that it freed two border guards who were taken as hostages by Jaish al-Adl in a “successful operation”.

Pakistan had not only condemned the action and recalled its envoy, but also stopped all scheduled engagements.

The caretaker Pakistan foreign minister, Jalil Abbas Jilani, told his counterpart in a phone call today that Iran's missile attack had caused “serious damage” to bilateral ties.

“The foreign minister added that Pakistan reserved the right to respond to this provocative act,” said a statement by the Pakistan foreign office.

According to the Dawn newspaper, a Pakistani delegation left a meeting of the joint border trade committee in the Iranian port of Chabahar midway on Wednesday. It also decided to postpone a meeting of the Chabahar Free Zone Business Exhibition.

Over the past year, there has been a series of attacks on Iranian security infrastructure along the country’s border with Pakistan.

In May 2023, clashes with an armed group in the Iranian province of Sistan-Baluchestan resulted in the deaths of five Iranian border guards. State media reported that the incident was attributed to ‘infiltrators’.

Two months later, in separate incidents, at least six Iranian policemen lost their lives. In the latest attack last month, 11 police officers died following an assault on a police station in the Iranian province.

The attacks inside Pakistan occurred one day after Iran's Revolutionary Guards launched ballistic missiles against “elements and agents of Mossad” in Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdistan region and at “anti-Iran terror groups” in Syria.

Iraq recalled its ambassador to Iran and submitted a letter to the UN Security Council and the UN Secretary General complaining against Iran for its “blatant violation on Iraq’s sovereignty, territorial integrity, and the security of the Iraqi people”.

The United States, United Kingdom and France have condemned the Iranian attack in Iraq, but have yet to react to the missile strikes inside Pakistan.

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