Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian flew to Islamabad yesterday for a day of meetings with with Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, army chief Asim Munir, President Asif Ali Zardari and other officials. Sharif said he and President Pezeshkian held “very productive discussions in a very cordial atmosphere,” reported dawn.com. Sharif announced that he would be traveling to Tehran next week to pay his respects to the late Iranian leader Ali Khamanei, who was killed by an Israeli air strike on Feb. 28. Both sides praised the “brotherly relations” between the two countries but otherwise little of substance appears to have been said during their public remarks.
There was at least one exception, however, when the two presidents quickly shot down a rumor on social media claiming that Sharif had said that Iran has agreed to hold negotiations on its ballistic missile program in the future.
Iran’s missiles were not in the memorandum of understanding signed with the US and “will never be,” Pezeshkian said, reported Reuters. Iran will never negotiate its defense capabilities with any country and believes strongly that regional peace and stability can only be reached through honest discussions and intraregional cooperation, Pezeshkian added.
Sharif, for his part, said there should be no double standards regarding ballistic missiles, saying that Iran has the same right to have them as other countries. “This MoU does not mention ballistic missiles,” he said. “It was never on the table; it was never on the agenda. Iran’s side never wanted to even discuss about it.”
