Pakistan and the United States are literally exploiting Iran’s domestic troubles which have become pronounced over the past five months. 

For Prime Minister Imran Khan and his powerful Army Chief Gen Bajwa, Iran scene presents a golden opportunity to refurbish their credentials before their financier and benefactor Saudi Arabia, which is unhappy at Islamabad’s meddling in Kabul.  And have begun needling the Tehran regime by stepping up their plan to fence the 959 km long border between the two countries.

The United States is finding new talking points in human rights, and repressive acts. Saying that the Iran regime is targeting innocent civilians, political opponents and peaceful protestors, the US office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) under the Treasury Department has sanctioned the ‘Special Unit of Iran’s Law Enforcement Forces and its Commander Hassan Karami and Brigade Commander Syed Reza Mousavi Azami.

There is no doubt that a wide spectrum of people in Iran have hit the agitation button. A host of issues that range from job insecurity to better pay and from drinking water woes to poor living conditions and blackouts of electricity have brought them to the streets.

Rallies, sit-ins and protests have become pronounced since July when ethnic Arab farmers in Khuzestan province were on the roads voicing concern over water scarcity.

From taxi and truck drivers to labour and trade unions, and miners, many working class people are in an agitation mood in over 100 cities. Even pensioners, farmers and academia have hit the streets to the discomfort of the regime in Tehran. 

Bushehr, Kurdistan, Khuzestan, Fars, East Azerbaijan and West Azerbaijan provinces witnessed sporadic protests throughout December by industrial workers, municipality employees, pensioners and contractual government employees.

Teachers staged nationwide demonstrations on Dec 11 demanding pay hike, better working conditions and release of their detained colleagues.  

A month earlier in November, farmers were up in arms in in the central Iranian city of Isfahan.

“For two weeks the Iranian government tolerated growing protests over scarce water supplies, watching them grow as restaurants served demonstrators free soup and barbers offered free haircuts”, reported The New York Times on November 26, and added “after the protests spilled over to at least one other city, the predictable happened on Friday: The government violently cracked down”.

The Supreme leader Sayyid Ali Hosseini Khamenei has approved a comprehensive plan to restructure the Iranian Law Enforcement Force (Niru-ye Entezami-ye Jomhuri-ye Eslami-ye Iran-NAJA) by splitting the ‘Intelligence & Public Security Police Department’ into two separate organisations, namely ‘Disciplinary Intelligence Organisation’ and ‘Public Security Police Organisation.’

The newly formed intelligence organisations would be the third largest setup after the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps – Intelligence Organisation and the Ministry of Intelligence & Security (MOIS). 

Against this backdrop came the US sanctions targeting Commander Hassan Karami and Brigade Commander Syed Reza Mousavi Azami of the ‘Special Unit of Iran’s Law Enforcement Forces.

The US led economic sanctions have apparently weighed heavily on Iran. Recession is at the door step with rising inflation (48 per cent), high unemployment (9 per cent) and poverty level (20 per cent).

Several industries are either shut down or on the verge of closure due to difficulty in obtaining raw materials, spare parts and credit.  Both the IMF and the World Bank have forecast a decline of 9 per cent in the GDP.  

With the Rial rapidly plunging to 3,10,000 to a dollar, the Iranian government is firming up plans to discontinue release of subsidized dollars to authorised import of essential items. This move will aggravate the inflationary pressures, sharply push up domestic prices of even medicines, and pump prime discontent among people.

It is this context, Conservative daily, Jomhouri Eslami, has sounded an alarm bell against a ‘catastrophe’ leading to a ‘revolution’ by the ‘barefoot against aristocracy.’

On Dec 19, the newspaper, wrote: “Though the society appears calm on the surface, there are alarming undercurrents which can trigger a storm, if the current situation continues.  There is a limit to the people’s patience!”

Delighted at Tehran’s preoccupation, Pakistan is trying to exploit the situation to meet its geo-political and strategic interests. Islamabad has not taken any action to address Iran’s objections to fencing the Pak-Iran border. Instead, it has constructed additional border observation towers and structures.

Tehran has demanded immediate dismantling of the new structures, saying that Pakistan’s border fencing in some stretches has come up inside the Iranian territory.  

Fence or no fence, the border will remain a flash point with Pak-based Sunni militant outfit, Jaish ul-Adl (Army of Justice), and its off-shoots carrying out hit and run attacks on the Iran side saying that they stand for the rights of Baloch Sunnis in Iran.

In a way, Jaish ul-Adl is seen as the incarnation of Jundallah, backed and funded by Pakistan, two decades ago to herald a bloody rebellion against Iranian Government, well at the behest of Washington. Tehran regards them as terrorist organizations.  

Pakistan is funding and backing Jaish ul-Adl as well to divert global attention from the abuses it is committing in Balochistan to Iran, according to a June 15, 2021 dispatch in the Afghan daily, Hasht-e- Subh. It added that these Sunni terrorist outfits take delight in kidnapping Iranian border guards.

One such kidnap invited a surgical strike by Iran’s Revolutionary Guards in Pakistan on the night of February 2, 2021.  

So, some fretting and fuming is going to be a norm rather than an exception between predominantly Shia Iran and Sunni majority Pakistan.

—–By James Crickton