Iran’s elite revolutionary border guards on Saturday closed Pak-Iran border at Taftan for five days over security concerns in the wake of upcoming Ashura event in the holy month of Muharram.
A security official said that Iranian border guards closed the border after talks with their Pakistani counterparts. “The border would remain closed for five days,” he said.
The border was sealed to avoid occurrence of any untoward incident and make sure security on both sides of the porous border during Ashura.
Pakistan has also deployed Frontier Corps (FC) personnel to strictly guard the border. The official said that trade activities at the border would remain suspended for five days.
Pakistan shares 900km border with Iran and recently some untoward incidents took place at the border.
Last month, Iranian guards stormed inside Pakistani territory and killed one FC official while injuring another three. Over 30 Iranian guards entered Pakistan and made the residents of Nokundi hostage for six hours as well.
Iran, on the other hand, claims that Pakistan-based militants carryout terror activities inside its land.
Besides the death of two Iranian guards by ‘rebels’ last month, the country claimed that an Iranian soldier was killed and two pro-government militiamen wounded in September in an attack blamed on the extremist group Jaishul Adl (Army of Justice).
The same group captured five Iranian soldiers in February, four of whom were released in April. The fate of the fifth man remains unknown.
Iran has repeatedly asked Pakistan to act to “stop the infiltration of terrorists” and has tasked the elite Revolutionary Guards to monitor the restive border region.
Skirmishes at the porous border prompted the two countries to postpone an important meeting in Tehran in late October, scheduled to sort out issues relating to the border violence.
