Pakistan said it targeted militant hideouts in Afghanistan’s Kandahar region overnight on Sunday, as fighting that erupted between the two neighbors late last month showed no signs of abating, according to the report.
The cross-border fighting, which has included Pakistani airstrikes in Afghanistan’s capital, Kabul, has been described as the deadliest yet between the two South Asian countries. Pakistan referred to the conflict as an “open war,” adding to concerns about regional stability as the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran engulfs the Middle East and beyond.
Pakistan’s information minister Attaullah Tarar said in a post on X that the military struck equipment storage facilities and “technical support infrastructure” in overnight attacks in Kandahar.
Afghanistan’s government spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid said Pakistan hit two locations. He said one site was used by security guards during the day and was empty at night, and he said a drug rehabilitation center suffered slight damage. Mujahid said there were no casualties, and that the strikes showed Pakistan was “continuing to invade and fuel the fire of war.”
Afghanistan’s Defense Ministry said on Sunday it carried out an attack on a Pakistani army camp in Pakistan’s South Waziristan area in retaliation for the Kandahar strikes. It said the attack destroyed most of the camp’s command center and other facilities and inflicted heavy casualties on the Pakistani military.
Pakistan’s Ministry of Information rejected that claim as “propaganda,” saying that a small drone was struck down and that “no military installation or infrastructure was hit.”
Afghanistan also said it carried out operations inside Pakistan across the border from Kunar and Nangarhar provinces, claiming to have captured a Pakistani military outpost and killed several soldiers. Pakistan rejected those claims.
Pakistan accuses Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers of harboring militant groups, particularly the Pakistani Taliban, or Tehrik-e-Taliban, which stage attacks inside Pakistan. Afghanistan denies the charge, saying it does not allow its territory to be used against other countries.
The latest fighting erupted in late February, when Afghanistan launched a cross-border attack into Pakistan in retaliation for Pakistani airstrikes inside Afghanistan days earlier that Pakistan said had killed only civilians. The clashes upended a ceasefire brokered by Qatar last October after fighting killed dozens of soldiers, civilians and suspected militants.
On Sunday, a mortar fired from Afghanistan destroyed a home in Bajaur, a district in northwestern Pakistan, killing at least four members of the same family and wounding two others, according to local government official Adnan Khan. Both sides have accused the other of targeting civilians, and dozens have been killed.
Pakistan’s President Asif Ali Zardari said Saturday that Afghanistan’s government had “crossed a red line” by launching drone attacks on civilian areas in Pakistan. Hours later, Pakistan reportedly conducted strikes on an Afghan drone storage facility.