UPDATES WITH STATEMENT BY AFGHAN AND PAKISTANI FOREIGN MINISTRIES; ADDS DETAILS; CHANGES HEADLINE, DECK, LEDE
By Riyaz ul Khaliq
ISTANBUL (AA) - Kabul on Monday summoned the top Pakistani diplomat in the country after Pakistan launched pre-dawn air strikes inside Afghanistan that killed at least eight people, an official statement said.
Interim Afghan Foreign Ministry said Kabul lodged a protest with Islamabad over the attacks.
Earlier Monday, interim Afghan administration spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid had said Pakistani military aircraft struck homes, killing eight people, including three children and five women in the southeastern Paktika and Khost provinces.
Islamabad confirmed that its forces carried out the attacks against militant targets and assured respect for the sovereignty of Afghanistan.
Later, Kabul launched its own retaliatory attacks, hitting Pakistani military installations across the border.
The cross-border aerial strikes were reported at around 3 a.m. (2230GMT Sunday).
Condemning the attacks as a "reckless violation of Afghanistan’s territory," Mujahid stressed that Afghanistan would "not allow anyone to invade its territory."
The airstrikes came after at least seven Pakistani troops were killed by militants in North Waziristan's Mir Ali area on Saturday.
Islamabad accuses Afghanistan of failing to prevent militants from the outlawed Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), a conglomerate of various militant groups, from carrying out attacks in Pakistan before returning to Afghanistan for refuge. Afghanistan has denied the charges.
It was in April 2022 when Pakistan launched cross-border air strikes against the alleged militants of the banned group.
"The person named Abdullah Shah, who the Pakistani side claims was targeted in the incident, is in Pakistan," Mujahid claimed.
"The people of Pakistan and the new government should stop some army generals from the continuation of their wrong policies for the benefit of others like the last 20 years and spoiling the relationship between the two neighboring Muslim nations," he added.
- 'Pakistani military installations hit'
In a separate statement, Afghanistan's interim Defense Ministry described the Pakistani airstrikes as an "aggressive operation," and said border forces "of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan retaliated by targeting Pakistan's military installations along the imaginary border with powerful weaponry."
Afghanistan does not recognize the Durand Line – the de facto border region between the two countries – on the grounds that it was created by a British colonial regime "to divide ethnic Pashtuns."
The 2,640-kilometer (1,640-mile) border was established in 1893 as part of an agreement between India under British colonial rule and Abdur Rahman Khan, the then-ruler of Afghanistan.
Pakistan and Afghanistan share 18 crossing points and the most frequently used for trade and people movement are Torkham and Chaman, which connect Pakistan's southwestern Balochistan province to Kandahar, Afghanistan's southern province.
The country's defense and security forces "remain prepared to counter any further aggressive actions and are committed to safeguarding their territorial integrity under all circumstances," warned the Afghan Defense Ministry.
- Pakistan confirms airstrikes
Pakistan's Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mumtaz Zahra Baloch confirmed the airstrikes, saying Islamabad carried out intelligence-based anti-terrorist operations in the border regions inside Afghanistan.
"The target of today’s operation was the terrorists belonging to Hafiz Gul Bahadur Group, which along with TTP, is responsible for multiple terrorist attacks inside Pakistan, resulting in deaths of hundreds of civilians and law enforcement officials," Baloch said in a statement.
"Over the past two years, Pakistan has repeatedly conveyed its serious concerns to the Interim Afghan Government over the presence of terror outfits including TTP inside Afghanistan," she said, adding that these "terrorists" pose a grave threat to Pakistan’s security and have consistently used Afghan territory to launch terror attacks inside Pakistani territory.
"Pakistan accords prime importance to the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Afghanistan. It has, therefore, always prioritized dialogue and cooperation to confront the terrorist threat," she said.