TEHRAN, Oct. 17 (MNA) – Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif has held a phone conversation with his Pakistani counterpart, calling on the neighboring country to intensify efforts to secure the release of abducted Iranian border guards.

A day after several Iranian border guards were kidnapped and taken across the border into Pakistan by a Takfiri terrorist group, Mohammad Javad Zarif made a phone call to his Pakistani counterpart Makhdoom Shah Mehmood Qureshi to call for swift and serious actions on the part of the neighboring country’s government to secure the release of the Iranian forces.

According to the Iranian Foreign Ministry’s Spokesman Bahram Ghasemi on Wednesday, the diplomatic apparatus started to take actions along with security and military bodies of the government since the early hours after the hostage taking incident took place.

Ghasemi added that joint committees have been formed based on bilateral political, security and military agreements between the two governments of Iran and Pakistan.

The spokesman of Iranian foreign ministry further noted that the Pakistani ambassador to Tehran had been summoned yesterday to call on the Pakistani government to seriously pursue the issue and the ambassador had promised that the Pakistani government would follow up on the issue seriously.

He underlined that Iran's ambassador to Islamabad also is seriously pursuing the issue there.

Ghasemi said that during the phone talk between the two countries’ foreign ministers, the Pakistani side promised that his government will spare no efforts to arrest and punish the perpetrators.

He also said that Mehmood Qureshi described the foreign-backed terrorists as a common enemy of the two nations who want to mar the bilateral relations between Iran and Pakistan and do not want the shared border to be in peace.

The spokesman of Iranian foreign ministry also urged the Pakistani government to take necessary measures to prevent such incidents from happening in the future.

Ghasemi further stressed that Iran cannot tolerate such incidents in the future and will not allow its borders to be insecure.

He warned that the terrorist groups need to await Iran’s harsh response, emphasizing that the Islamic Republic of Iran will confront with foreign-backed Takfiri terrorist groups as it has done over the past years.

KI/4433454