Pakistan’s military said it targeted and destroyed several Afghan Taliban posts in a remote area of the country’s southwestern Balochistan province on Wednesday, framing the action as retaliation for what officials described as “unprovoked aggression.”
Pakistani officials said the strikes were carried out in response to attacks they attributed to the Afghan Taliban, with Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi saying the military had thwarted “malicious intentions” through timely action and that Pakistan was giving a “befitting response” to the aggression.
Two Pakistani security officials said Pakistan also struck hideouts of the Pakistani Taliban near the town of Chaman, in Balochistan. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief the media.
The latest escalation follows an attack a day earlier in the same area, when the officials said a mortar shell fired by the Afghan Taliban hit a house near Chaman, killing one civilian and wounding two others.
The developments come after Afghan officials said mortars and missiles fired from Pakistan struck a university and homes in northeastern Afghanistan, killing seven people and wounding at least 85. Pakistan has denied targeting a university or carrying out such strikes, and the cross-border dispute remains contested on both sides.
Pakistan’s military actions also unfold amid recent efforts to reduce tensions brokered through talks in China earlier this month. The Chinese government said Afghan and Pakistani officials met in western China in early April and agreed not to escalate their conflict and to “explore a comprehensive solution.”
A U.N. humanitarian report this month said hostilities between Afghanistan and Pakistan continued at a lower intensity after the China talks, but still caused damage inside Afghanistan. The U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said periodic shelling, including mortar rounds fired into Afghan territory from April 19-21, damaged a school and a health facility in Afghanistan’s Kunar province.
The report added that mortar fire and airstrikes in Asadabad city and in the Sarkani and Marawara districts of Kunar on Monday reportedly killed at least seven people and wounded 79. It also said infrastructure was damaged, including a fuel station in Asadabad’s Yargul area, a student accommodation wing at Kunar University, the Directorate of Pilgrimage and Religious Affairs, and a drug rehabilitation center.
Pakistan has seen a surge in attacks in recent years, many of them claimed by the Pakistani Taliban, known as Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, or TTP. Pakistan accuses Afghanistan of harboring militants that carry out attacks inside Pakistan, and it says those militants are linked to or include the TTP, while Kabul denies the accusation.