The site of a bomb blast in Karachi on May 12, 2022
Iran has rejected a Pakistani official’s claim that a man killed in a gun battle Wednesday and suspected of a recent bomb attack in Karachi was trained in Iran.
Iran’s embassy in Islamabad issued a statement Friday and dismissed allegations “made in public and in the media without providing any evidence, proof or documents to the government of the Islamic Republic of Iran through official means.” The statement called this “completely unprofessional and unacceptable.”
On Thursday, Syed Khurram Ali Shah, a senior official at the Counterterrorism Department in Sindh province, was quoted in a statement claiming that one of two militants – named as ‘Allah Dino’ – killed by Pakistani forces the previous day had been “taking instructions” from an Iranian commander named as Asghar Shah, “who operates his group from Iran, through phone calls, the video of which is available.”
Allah Dino, “an expert in making improvised explosive devices (IEDs)” had received his military training in Iran, the statement read.
At least one person was killed and several injured in the bombing May 12 in the Saddar quarter of Karachi. Responsibility was claimed by the little-known Sindhudesh Revolutionary Army (SRA), a group fighting for independence for the south-eastern Sindh. Iran and Pakistan have long traded accusations that the other harbors militants who launch attacks on the neighboring country.