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Pakistan has carried out cross-border strikes and ground operations in eastern Afghanistan, killing 25 militants, Pakistan’s information minister Attaullah Tarar said on Monday.
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The operation was aimed at a group that Islamabad blames for a deadly weekend attack on the regional headquarters of the paramilitary Rangers in the southern port city of Karachi; however, Afghan authorities have repeatedly denied that their territory harbours militants.
The ground operation was followed by “precision strikes” overnight in eastern Afghanistan, Islamabad announced.
The offensive targeted Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, a breakaway faction of the Pakistani Taliban (TTP), as the Afghan government reported dozens of civilian casualties.
“Three targets in Paktia, Paktika and Kunar were destroyed during precision strikes,” Tarar stated, adding that the military operation focused strictly on the hideouts and safe havens of the group.
The Taliban government in Kabul strongly disputed Pakistan’s narrative, stating that the airstrikes in the three eastern provinces primarily hit civilian areas. Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid condemned the military action, calling it a “cowardly act of aggression,” and Afghan authorities have repeatedly denied that their territory harbours militants.
The strikes are the latest flare-up of violence between the two countries whose relationship has been fraught since 2021, when the Taliban government took power, and follow a weeks-long war that erupted in February.
The ongoing conflict
Pakistan has defended its recent cross-border military strikes in Afghanistan as a domestic necessity in its battle against militancy, even as Islamabad actively mediates between the United States and Iran to end their separate war in the Middle East.
The escalation follows a major security breach on Saturday, when explosives were detonated, and gunmen opened fire inside a Rangers paramilitary camp in Karachi, one of the worst militant attacks in Pakistan’s most populous city in years, that left three paramilitary personnel dead. Authorities subsequently detained an Afghan national, who is suspected of being one of several individuals involved in the assault.
Sides have struggled to maintain a stable peace since going to war in late February. Weeks of fierce fighting have continued along the frontier and unprecedented Pakistani air strikes on Afghan cities, including Kabul and the southern stronghold of Kandahar, where the Taliban supreme leader is based. The violence killed hundreds and displaced tens of thousands of people, according to the United Nations.
Fragile truce and heavy civilian toll
Although the two countries agreed to a ceasefire in March, the truce has been punctuated by intermittent attacks. Afghan officials reported that Pakistani strikes in June alone killed 13 people.
Kabul has repeatedly denied that its territory is used by international militants, countering that Pakistani operations have extracted a heavy civilian toll. Among these was a strike at an Afghan drug treatment centre in March, which the UN stated killed hundreds of people.
International mediation efforts from several countries, including China, have so far failed to secure a lasting diplomatic resolution between the neighbours. As a result of the persistent friction, the shared frontier has remained largely closed since a previous wave of cross-border violence in October.
