KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) – Ground operations and attacks by Pakistani forces killed at least 36 civilians in Afghanistan overnight and wounded more than 160 others, Afghan officials said Monday, as tensions between the neighbors escalated. An Afghan official said the attacks would be met with retaliation.
Pakistan said the operations were launched in response to militant attacks all over Pakistan. Security forces carried out a ground operation along the border late Sunday, following attacks on militant hideouts and safe havens, killing 29 fighters, Pakistan’s Information Minister Attaullah Tarar said.
Afghanistan condemned the attacks in Paktia, Paktika and Kunar provinces as a “cowardly act of aggression” and an “act of brutality”. Hayatullah Mohajer Farahi, deputy minister for publications at the Ministry of Information and Culture, said Afghanistan would respond “in due course”.
Hamdullah Fitrat, deputy spokesman for Afghanistan’s Taliban government, said Pakistani forces targeted a house in Paktia’s Chamkani district, killing an elderly man and a child, while other family members were injured. When residents gathered to rescue people, the area was hit again, killing 28 villagers and injuring 158, he said.
Six people, mostly women and children, were killed in a village in Giyan district, Paktika province, when another house was hit, he said. A civilian house in Kunar province was also hit, causing no casualties but killing about 30 cattle.
The UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan independently confirmed that at least 28 civilians were killed and 49 others wounded in the attacks, including women and children. He added that the figures were preliminary and could increase.
Pakistani officials said an uneasy calm prevailed along the border on Monday, with security forces remaining on high alert.
Envoys have been called for the attacks
On Monday, Afghanistan and Pakistan summoned each other’s top diplomats to protest the attacks.
Zia Ahmad Takal, deputy spokesperson for Afghanistan’s Foreign Ministry, accused Islamabad of repeatedly blaming Afghanistan for security incidents inside Pakistan without “credible evidence”.
Pakistan’s behavior “seriously damages the atmosphere of trust between the two countries, good-neighborly relations and the security and stability of the region,” Takal said.
Pakistan’s foreign ministry said it summoned the top Afghan diplomat in Islamabad to protest the involvement of Afghan nationals in recent attacks, including one in Karachi over the weekend.
Militant attacks targeting Pakistan’s police and security forces have increased in recent years. Authorities have blamed the Pakistani Taliban, or TTP, and allied militant groups for much of the violence. The Pakistani Taliban are divided but allied with the Afghan Taliban who returned to power in 2021.
Tarar, Pakistan’s information minister, shared three videos on X that he said showed shells hitting the sprawling camps and safe havens of Jamaat-ul-Ahrar and Fitna al-Khawarij in Afghanistan’s Paktia, Paktika and Kunar provinces. Tarar said the overnight attacks killed “terrorists” and destroyed caches of weapons and ammunition.
Pakistan uses the phrase “Khawarij” to refer to the Indian-backed Pakistani Taliban and other militants. Jamaat-ul-Ahrar is a breakaway faction of the Pakistani Taliban.
Tarar said Pakistan’s counter-terrorism campaign “will continue at full speed to wipe out the menace of foreign-sponsored and supported terrorism from the country.”
However, India denied any involvement, with Foreign Office spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal calling the statements “baseless allegations”. Pakistan must “look inward, take credible action against the terrorist infrastructure on its soil,” he said.
Pakistan launches operation after Karachi attack
The Pakistani security operation followed a militant attack targeting the regional headquarters of paramilitary Rangers in Karachi that killed three soldiers. Security forces killed three attackers and arrested another attacker, whom the military identified as a wounded Afghan national.
Jamaat-ul-Ahrar claimed responsibility for the Karachi attack.
Officials in Pakistan claimed an Afghan suspect was captured after the attack, saying “Afghan soil and Afghan nationals continue to be used to orchestrate terrorist attacks inside Pakistan.” Police later released the statement of the injured Afghan detainee, who said the Karachi attack was planned by Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, although it was unclear whether the confession was made under duress.
Sunday’s cross-border attacks and ground operations came less than three weeks after Pakistan’s military launched airstrikes on what it said were militant hideouts in Afghanistan. they ended about a month of relative calm after what Islamabad had described as an “open war” between the neighboring countries, despite international efforts to broker a lasting peace.
The escalation comes after several months of military action. Hundreds of people have been killed in cross-border fighting since February, when Afghanistan launched retaliatory attacks after Pakistan carried out airstrikes inside Afghan territory.
Multiple rounds of talks have failed to secure a lasting ceasefire. China waited the two sides in April and Beijing later said Pakistan and Afghanistan had agreed not to escalate their conflict and to explore a solution.
By ABDUL QAHAR AFGHAN and SUZAN FRASER Associated Press
Fraser reported from Ankara, Turkey. Associated Press writer Munir Ahmed contributed from Islamabad.
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