Islamabad — Pakistan’s army, backed by artillery and air power, pounded most Afghan military installations inside Afghanistan overnight and early Saturday, killing more than 300 Afghan troops in border clashes during the day, government spokesmen and officials said.
Afghanistan has been targeting each other’s military positions since Thursday night in response to Pakistan’s offensive, which Islamabad said hit seven training camps and hideouts of the Pakistani Taliban, known as Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan. The group is separate but closely allied with the Afghan Taliban.
More than 331 Afghan Taliban forces were killed and more than 500 injured in the ongoing military offensive in Afghanistan, Pakistan’s Information Minister Ataullah Tarar said, adding that Pakistan had destroyed 102 Afghan posts, captured 22 others and destroyed 163 tanks and armored vehicles at 37 locations.
On Saturday, Pakistan’s state media reported that the country’s air force had carried out strikes targeting key military installations in various areas of eastern Afghanistan.
According to Pakistani officials, hundreds of residents living near the northwestern Torkum border crossing have fled to safer areas. In recent days, Pakistan has transported dozens of Afghan refugees who were waiting at the Torquam crossing to return to safer places.
There was no immediate response from the Afghan government on Pakistan’s claims on Saturday.
Afghanistan’s defense ministry said on Saturday that Afghanistan attacked Pakistani military bases in Miransha and Spin Wham overnight, destroying military installations and causing heavy casualties in response to ongoing airstrikes by Pakistan.
In eastern Afghanistan, the Department of Information and Culture accused Pakistan of targeting civilian areas, destroying homes and killing at least 11 people. There was no immediate response from Pakistan, which said it was only targeting military installations to avoid any civilian casualties.
“The brave forces of the Islamic Emirate destroyed the commissariat, military units and three important security towers of the Pakistani military administration,” Mullah Taj Mohammad Naqshbandi, the Afghan commissioner on the Afghan side of the Tarkum border, said in a statement on Saturday.
On Friday, the Afghan government said 55 Pakistani soldiers were killed during its attack and that Afghan casualties were much lower than Pakistan’s claims.
Afghan government spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said on Friday that the country’s attacks on Pakistani military targets were “a message that our hands can reach their throats and we will respond to every evil act by Pakistan”. “Pakistan has never tried to resolve issues through dialogue,” he said.
That same day, Pakistan’s Defense Minister Khawaja Mohammad Asif wrote in X: “Our patience is now over. Now it is open war between us.” Pakistan has often accused Kabul of harboring the TTP, a charge the group and Afghanistan’s Taliban government deny.
Pakistan’s military spokesman, Lt. Gen. Ahmed Sharif Chaudhary, said on Friday that the Afghan government had only one choice: “Choose TTP or Pakistan.”
Ejaz ul Haq, an Afghan refugee, said he was stuck with his family near the Torkham border and could not return to Afghanistan because of the fighting. Many are still struggling for food while fasting during the month of Ramadan, he said.
Guftar, a Pakistani villager living near Torkham, urged governments to reach a ceasefire, saying ordinary people were bearing the brunt of the conflict.
Tensions have been high since October, when dozens of soldiers, civilians and suspected militants were killed in border clashes. A Qatari-brokered ceasefire ended intense fighting that month, but several rounds of peace talks in Turkey in November failed to produce a lasting deal. The two sides have occasionally traded fire, though a ceasefire has largely been in place for the past week in what Pakistan describes as TTP hideouts.
Since then, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, China and several other countries have again tried to defuse tensions by intervening.
Qatar’s Minister of State Mohammed bin Abdul Aziz Al-Khulaifi spoke on Friday with the foreign ministers of Afghanistan and Pakistan in an effort to ease tensions, Qatar’s foreign ministry said in a post on X.
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Abdul Kahar Afghan reports from Kabul, Afghanistan. Riaz Khan and Rasool Dawar contributed to this story in Peshawar, Pakistan
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