A close examination of Iran-Pakistan relations reveals differences and many difficulties. Both might be Islamic nations, but Pakistan is Sunni-dominated, while Iran is overwhelmingly Shi'ite. This difference would assume critical importance in their bilateral relations with the 1979 Iranian Revolution. Relations between the Pakistan's military dictator General Zia ul-Haq and Iran's new rulers were poor right from the start. Iran's rulers viewed Zia with deep suspicion. How could they forget the fact that the general had traveled to Iran in 1977-78 to shore up the Shah's regime.
What contributed further to the deterioration in Pakistan-Iran relations was Zia's Islamization initiative that was set in motion in 1979. This drive claimed to have a universal Islamic vision. In reality it was based on a narrow Sunni interpretation of Islamic theology and law. It was therefore unacceptable to Iran's Shi'ite clerics. As Zia's government pressed ahead with its sectarian agenda – it took a series of measures that gave a fillip to Sunni extremism, even encouraging the setting up of Sunni militant organizations –the Iranian government pushed ahead with exporting Shi'ite extremism, encouraging and arming Shi'ite extremism to counter Sunni militancy in Pakistan.
In the process, Pakistan became an important battleground between Sunni and Shi'ite forces in the region. This had serious impact on Iran-Pakistan relations. The impact of this backing of Shi'ite and Sunni extremism by the Iranian and Pakistani governments is felt to date in the region.
This mutual suspicion would deepen as the crisis in Afghanistan erupted and worsened. Zia's cozying up with the Americans and the way he welcomed the American military presence into Pakistan/Afghanistan and therefore the region was deeply resented by Iran's anti-American rulers. While Iran was uneasy with the proximity of the Americans to its borders, it was just as unhappy with the irreligious Soviets' occupation of Afghanistan.
Iran armed and funded Shi'ite resistance groups throughout the 1980s and maintained links with them after the Soviet withdrawal in late 1989. The rise of the Sunni Taliban in the mid-1990s in Afghanistan triggered great alarm in Iran and Pakistan's role in this development naturally plunged Iran-Pakistan relations further. It simultaneously led to a new warming in India-Iran relations, contributing to heightened suspicion in Pakistan of Teheran's intentions towards Islamabad.
With Iran and India backing the Northern Alliance and coordinating its anti-Taliban strategy in Afghanistan, Pakistan's wariness of Iran deepened. In August 1998, Iran was enraged with Pakistan for not preventing the killing of several of its diplomats who were captured by the Taliban in the northern Afghan city of Mazar-e-Sharif. It did seem for a while that Iran would even militarily retaliate for the death of its diplomats and that Pakistan would not escape Tehran's wrath.
Post-Taliban, Iran-Pakistan ties seem to have improved. Iran's concerns with regard to Pakistan's backing of the Taliban seem to have been allayed somewhat with the Pakistani government reversing its earlier policy of support to the Taliban. Tehran and Islamabad have taken big strides with regard to a proposed pipeline from Iran's oilfields through Pakistan to India and the two have recently agreed to conduct joint naval exercises.
These, however, seem to be incidents of tactical cooperation between Iran and Pakistan. Mutual suspicion persists. Tehran blames Pakistan for the American presence in Afghanistan and Central Asia. It suspects Pakistan of cooperating with the US against Iran.
Pakistan suspects an Iranian hand in the turmoil in Balochistan. It believes that Iran is wary of the emergence of Gwadar port as a serious competitor to the strategic significance to the Iranian port city of Chabahar. And it is wary of Iran's warming ties with its number one enemy, India.
For all their claims of "brotherly ties", therefore, Iran and Pakistan have been deeply suspicious of each other for decades. It is therefore difficult to understand the nuclear cooperation between these two bitter rivals. It does seem that while they were on the one hand busy arming rival militias, they were also holding hands - albeit clandestinely - on the nuclear issue.
Asia Times Online :: South Asia news, business and economy from India and Pakistan
Everything is relative. Pakistan and Iran have had extremely close ties in the past because the interests converged. In the future if both are faced with similar threats, convergence of interests is very much a likelihood.
