As two Muslim-majority neighbours with historic ties, Iran and Pakistan are no strangers to bilateral visits. Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian visited Islamabad back in August, meeting with his counterpart, Asif Ali Zardari. But this week’s visit to Pakistan by Iran’s national security adviser, Ali Larijani, carries special weight.
Mr Larijani occupies a particular place in the Iranian establishment. Much of Iran’s political class has been divided over its international orientation, with reformists and centrists often looking to the West, while many hardliners put their hopes on growing military ties with Russia or China.
A conservative centrist, Mr Larijani is thought to somewhat straddle this divide. He is close to West-facing factions of the Iranian establishment, such as former president Hassan Rouhani, but also sees value in Iran’s ties to Beijing and Moscow. In his few months in the job, he has visited Russia, Belarus and Lebanon, trying to show Iran as defiant following the shocks of its 12-day war with Israel and the US.
His visit to Pakistan, Iran’s only nuclear-armed neighbour, is a part of the
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