Pakistan: air strikes on ten sites in Afghanistan. Kabul: four dead
The bombings come after an escalation that has been ongoing for days. The government in Kabul denies having attacked its neighbouring country
from our correspondent Marco Masciaga
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NEW DELHI – The Pakistani government has announced that on Thursday morning its air force carried out air strikes against ten sites in Afghanistan, with the aim of targeting the bases from which drones were reportedly launched towards Pakistani territory on Wednesday. The air strikes hit the southern and eastern Afghan provinces of Kandahar, Paktia and Khost, killing four civilians, Afghan government spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said in a statement. “These shameful acts of aggression and the attacks carried out by the Pakistani military regime will receive an appropriate response,” he said.
These comments came a few hours after Islamabad’s announcement. ‘In exercising its sovereign right to self-defence,’ wrote Information Minister Attaullah Tarar on X at dawn on Thursday — “Pakistan has carried out precision air and drone strikes against 10 locations in Afghanistan used for the launch and storage of drones”. Tarar added that the attacks were “deliberate, precise, calibrated and proportionate, and strictly limited to military targets identified as being directly linked to attempts to attack Pakistan”.
This refers to the events of Wednesday, when the Armed Forces of Islamabad reportedly shot down eight rudimentary drones that had taken off from Afghan territory, after repelling an attempt to infiltrate by land. The launch of the drones was reportedly accompanied by a number of artillery rounds fired at a border post.
The most recent clashes come just a few days after the attacks carried out on Monday by the Islamabad Armed Forces in the eastern regions of Afghanistan against a number of ‘militant hideouts’. According to the Pakistani Ministry of Information, 28 militants were killed in these attacks, whilst the Afghan authorities reported at least three civilians killed and four wounded. The United Nations mission in Afghanistan has confirmed the civilian casualties, whilst Kabul has lodged a formal protest against the attack.
Monday’s Pakistani air strikes followed a firefight with militants in the Hangu district of the north-western province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, near the Afghan border, in which six members of the Pakistani security forces were killed. A few days earlier, a suicide bomber had struck a mosque within a police compound in the nearby town of Kohat. Subsequently, eight armed men stormed the compound, sparking a gun battle that lasted around 20 hours and claimed the lives of at least 21 people, most of whom were police officers.
