Iranian President Masoud Pejeshkian gave a stern warning regarding global security during talks with Pakistani Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif. According to Iranian state media, Pejeshkian said that if the international community fails to punish the parties responsible for the war, the global order could be completely endangered. He stressed that ignoring the real actors in the conflict would further destabilize the international system. The Iranian President appealed to the global community to immediately pay attention to the dangerous consequences of the ongoing war and fix responsibility. This conversation took place at a time when tension is very high in the area.
Pakistan thought it had found the formula: flatter Trump, make firm promises to Saudi Arabia, and appease Iran with phone calls and affection. This formula worked for a while, but then the US and Israel assassinated Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei, missiles began falling into the Gulf, and Pakistan’s carefully constructed diplomatic system began to crumble under the weight of a war it never planned for.
There are three big challenges before Pakistan…
Shahbaz Sharif’s Pakistan now faces three challenges simultaneously. It will have to manage a defense pact with Saudi Arabia, which has never been tested so severely before. It will have to manage a restless and angry Shia population, which makes up about 20 percent of its 250 million citizens. And it will have to avoid doing anything that might harm its newly formed relationship with Washington. The problem is that these three objectives are now separate from each other.
