Pakistan conducted airstrikes and ground military operations along its border with Afghanistan on Monday, with Islamabad claiming at least 29 suspected terrorists were killed. Afghan officials, however, told a very different story — saying the attacks left dozens of civilians dead and hundreds injured.
According to Reuters, Pakistani forces reported killing at least 29 suspected militants during the operation. Authorities said 25 of those killed died in airstrikes targeting three separate locations in the Afghan provinces of Paktia, Paktika, and Kunar. Four additional fighters linked to the Jamaat-ul-Ahrar faction of Pakistan’s Taliban were killed in ground operations in the Bajaur district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
Pakistan’s Information Minister Attaullah Tarar announced on social media platform X that the strikes destroyed “large quantities” of weapons and ammunition, adding that the country’s security forces had carried out precise hits on terrorist camps and hiding places.
At a press conference, Tarar said the military action was triggered by a string of recent terrorist attacks, pointing specifically to a Saturday assault by Jamaat-ul-Ahrar on a Sindh Rangers facility in Karachi. That attack killed three troops and left four others wounded. Tarar also acknowledged that Pakistani aircraft carried out a second strike on one of the targeted sites while rescue efforts were already underway.
Afghanistan strongly rejected Pakistan’s version of events. Government spokesperson Hamdullah Fitrat said the strikes resulted in 38 civilian deaths and left 163 people injured, including women and children. Fitrat said the bulk of those casualties came from a Pakistani strike on a home in Paktia province, where 28 people were killed and 158 others were hurt.
The stark difference in casualty numbers has deepened the rift between Islamabad and Kabul, and analysts say the situation is likely to further inflame tensions along the shared border — tensions that already boiled over in clashes between the two countries back in February.
Pakistan has long accused Afghanistan’s Taliban-led government of sheltering terrorists who plan and carry out attacks on Pakistani soil. The Afghan Taliban has repeatedly denied those accusations, maintaining that terrorism is a domestic problem for Pakistan to address on its own.
