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The ruins of a house destroyed by Pakistani airstrikes in Mandakhel village, Chamkani district of Paktia province, Afghanistan, on the 29th (local time). / Courtesy of EPA and Yonhap News Agency

At least 36 civilians were killed and more than 160 others injured after the Pakistani military launched late-night airstrikes combined with ground operations across three provinces bordering Afghanistan.

According to AP and other media outlets on the 30th (local time), the Pakistani military conducted combined ground operations and airstrikes in the Afghan provinces of Paktia, Paktika, and Kunar between the night of the 28th and the following day. Pakistani Information Minister Attaullah Tarar stated that the operation neutralized 29 militants and destroyed weapons and ammunition storage facilities.

The heaviest casualties occurred in the Chamkani district of Paktia province, which suffered a double-strike. According to Hamdullah Fitrat, a deputy spokesperson for the Afghan Taliban government, Pakistani forces initially struck a residential home, killing an elderly man and a child. As local residents gathered to rescue survivors, a second airstrike hit the exact same area, killing 28 more people and wounding 158. In the Giyan district of Paktika province, another residential strike claimed the lives of six people, including women and children.

The Afghan Taliban government condemned the strikes as a "cowardly act of aggression and a brutality," warning that they would "definitely retaliate at an appropriate time."

Pakistan maintained that the operation was a direct response to a militant attack inside its borders on the 28th. On that day, an attack targeting a regional command of the paramilitary Rangers in the largest city of Karachi left three soldiers dead. Military authorities stated that a suspect captured alive while wounded held Afghan nationality. Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, a splinter faction of the Pakistani Taliban (TTP), claimed responsibility for the Karachi attack.

Minister Tarar pointed to India as the backer of the militant group, vowing to "root out foreign-sponsored terrorism." However, Indian Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal immediately rejected the allegation as "baseless." He countered that Pakistan should instead "take credible action against the terrorist infrastructure on its own soil."

This military action shattered a brief period of calm that had lasted for nearly a month since Pakistan struck suspected militant hideouts inside Afghanistan three weeks ago. Pakistani authorities reported that a tense lull is being maintained along the border, with the military remaining on high alert.

Hundreds of people have been killed in both nations since Pakistan launched airstrikes inside Afghan territory last February, which triggered retaliatory strikes from Afghanistan. Although China hosted both sides in April and brokered an agreement to prevent the conflict from escalating, skirmishes have continued. The latest assault has once again broken the fragile calm that had settled over the border since Pakistan's air raid on militant safe havens three weeks prior.

                                                                                                             Jeong Ri-na