Shiraz hosted the festival from November 26 to December 3, 2025. Over the past seven days, the festival not only featured Iranian artists and filmmakers, but also artists from 200 countries around the world.
On the occasion of the International Fajr Film Festival in Shiraz, a correspondent of Mehul News Agency conducted an interview with Aurangzeb Khan Kich, Minister of National Heritage and Culture of Pakistan. Its contents are as follows.
Thank you very much for giving me this opportunity to interview you. The first question was what cultural relations currently exist between Iran and Pakistan.
Thank you for waking us up for the interview. And I am honored to be interviewed by this famous Iranian news agency. I would like to ask you about the relationship and cultural relationship between Pakistan and Iran.I believe that both Iran and Pakistan share the same history, the same culture, and the same civilization, and we really cooperate in all aspects of cultural activities between the two countries. Following President Masoud Pezeshkian’s visit to Pakistan, we have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between Iran and Pakistan on Culture and Heritage, pursuant to which both the ministries of Pakistan and Iran will move towards achieving the goals of the MoU.
Given the similarities between the two countries, in which cultural areas could cooperation be expanded?
First of all, there are the main areas to explore the message of Iqbal Lahori. As much as Iqbal is better known and loved than Iranian-born Pakistanis, both countries cherish Iqbal’s ideas and vision. We are collaborating to translate two-thirds of Iqbal’s poems, the Persian version, into Urdu. And secondly, we are trying to do religious tourism between Pakistan and Iran, but overall there are very few tourists coming to Iran to explore the whole country, and tourists going to Pakistan. Both ministries are working to make it easier for tourists from both countries to visit tourist destinations in both countries.
How can the cultural institutions of both countries contribute to strengthening and promoting Persian literature?
The good news is that all the famous and prestigious universities of Pakistan have Persian departments and people now think that it was Persian before the British came to the subcontinent. So our history, our strength is all written in Persian, and all the great manuscripts that are in our museums are also written in Persian. Therefore, we are trying our best to preserve this Persian treasure in our country and hope that the same vice versa will be done in Urdu in Iran.
And how effective are exhibitions and festivals in developing cultural relations between the two countries?
Festivals like film festivals and other festivals are the main source of people-to-people contact and we in Pakistan support these activities and in Iran we also believe that such activities will make the people contract between the two countries more binding and more beneficial. And especially in this film festival, Fajr Film Festival, we are learning a lot from the Iranian film industry, which ranks very highly in the world. Our directors and producers are also interested in this festival and believe that they can learn a lot by participating in this festival.
What suggestions do you have to create the necessary conditions for expanding cultural cooperation?
First of all, we want to ease visa policies for tourists from both countries. I am pleased to inform you that we have met with your honorable Minister of Culture and there we have formed a working group from both countries and analyzed it to get suggestions on how to move things forward more quickly. And I’m glad that we’ve decided on a six-year to one-year, six-month to one-year schedule to accomplish these things.
As a final question, how is the screening of good films, especially Iranian films, managed in Pakistan and welcomed by the people?
They (films) are very welcome and I have requested Iranian Minister of Culture Esmaili to participate by bringing the films to Pakistan as we are organizing the first ever Noro festival at the government level in Pakistan. Organize Iranian Film Week in Pakistan. We believe that because of the high standards of Iranian films and Iranian actors, Pakistanis want to see them on screen.
MNA