Tensions between the two South Asian neighbors have increased as a result of reports of injuries on both sides of the Durand Line from Pakistani and Afghan officials. Pakistan described the actions as unjustified and said it replied swiftly, while Afghanistan claimed it launched retaliation attacks.
Pakistan launched “Operation Righteous Fury” in reaction to “unprovoked” Afghan attacks, killing or injuring dozens of Afghan Taliban soldiers, according to Mosharraf Zaidi, spokesman for Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, late Thursday.
More than 120 Afghan Taliban fighters have been wounded, and 72 of them have been killed. According to him, seven Afghan Taliban installations have been taken and sixteen have been destroyed.
According to Zaidi, they also destroyed an Afghan Taliban sector headquarters, an Afghan Taliban battalion headquarters, and a sizable munitions dump.
“So far, more than 36 tanks, artillery guns and armoured personnel carriers have been destroyed,” he said.
According to the Dawn newspaper, two security officials have been killed in the ongoing skirmishes.
Hamdullah Fiteat, the Afghan deputy spokesman, reported that Afghan forces had captured 23 bodies and killed 55 Pakistani soldiers. Officials said they had taken over installations in Pakistan.
But Zaidi claimed that “no Pakistani posts were captured or damaged” and that its soldiers “inflicted heavy losses” in retaliation across the border.
Reports of casualties on both sides of the border could not be reliably verified by TRT World.
The Durand Line, a porous border between the two neighbors, is the site of continued combat, according to the most recent sources.
The most recent fighting follows Pakistan’s claim that it killed 70 “terrorists” in Afghanistan last week through airstrikes.
