By Staff Reporter
ISLAMABAD: The Foreign Office on Saturday issued a travel advisory, urging Pakistani citizens to steer clear of nonessential trips to neighbouring Iran as deadly protests over economic grievances there entered their second week.
The advisory came amid reports of mounting casualties in Iran, where demonstrations ignited by soaring living costs have prompted widespread internet blackouts and a fierce government crackdown. “For their safety and security, Pakistani nationals are advised to avoid all unnecessary travel to the Islamic Republic of Iran until conditions improve,” the Foreign Office said in a statement. It further cautioned Pakistanis already in Iran to “exercise extreme caution, remain vigilant, minimise non-essential travel, and stay in regular contact with the Pakistani missions” in Tehran, Zahidan and Mashhad.
The unrest in Iran, which began on Dec. 28, has drawn sharp international condemnation and threats of retaliation, escalating tensions between Tehran and Washington. The Iranian rights group HRANA reported on Friday that at least 62 people had been killed since the protests erupted, including 14 members of the security forces and 48 demonstrators.
The violence has prompted a war of words between Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and President Donald J. Trump of the United States. At the start of January, Trump had warned that American forces were “locked and loaded” and prepared to respond if Iranian authorities killed protesters. In his first public remarks on the escalating turmoil, Ayatollah Khamenei on Friday denounced the demonstrators as “vandals” and “saboteurs.”
In a speech broadcast on state television, he accused Trump of hypocrisy, declaring that the president’s hands “are stained with the blood of more than a thousand Iranians,” an apparent allusion to Israel’s war against Iran in June, which the United States supported and joined with its own strikes. Ayatollah Khamenei went on to predict that the “arrogant” American leader would meet a fate similar to that of the imperial dynasty ousted in Iran’s 1979 revolution. “He would be overthrown,” the ayatollah said.
Trump fired back with a fresh warning to Iran’s leaders on Friday. “You better not start shooting because we’ll start shooting too,” he said. “I just hope the protesters in Iran are going to be safe, because that’s a very dangerous place right now.”
Pakistan, which shares a porous border with Iran and has long navigated delicate ties with both Tehran and Washington, has sought to remain neutral in the crisis. Earlier this week, in its first public comments since the protests began, a Foreign Office spokesperson said Islamabad’s opposition to outside meddling. The spokesperson said Pakistan firmly opposed any foreign interference in the domestic affairs of other countries, including Iran, and viewed the situation as an internal matter. He rejected external pressure or aggression and stressed that Pakistan did not wish to comment on Iran’s internal developments.
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