Islamabad under attack? Afghan ministry claims airstrikes on multiple Pakistani military sites

Islamabad/Kabul: Afghanistan’s Ministry of National Defence said Friday that its air force carried out “successful” strikes on multiple Pakistani military sites in response to cross-border attacks, escalating tensions between the two neighbours.

In a post on X, the defence ministry confirmed air operations targeting army camps near Faizabad, Nowshera, Jamrud, Abbottabad, and other locations.

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“This afternoon, at approximately 11:00 AM, the Air Force of the Ministry of National Defence launched airstrikes targeting a military camp near Faizabad in Islamabad, Pakistan, as well as an army barracks in Nowshera, and a military site in Jamrud.… These strikes came in response to the air violations carried out by Pakistani military circles last night in Kabul, Kandahar, and Paktia,” it read.

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The statement came amid mounting hostilities, with Pakistan’s Defence Minister Khawaja Mohammad Asif warning that Islamabad had run out of “patience” and that the situation had escalated into “open war” with Afghanistan.

“Our patience has now run out. Now it is open war between us,” Asif said on X, alleging that the Taliban had turned Afghanistan “into a colony of India” and begun “exporting terrorism.”

The latest clash follows reciprocal strikes after an Afghan cross-border attack and comes despite a previously mediated ceasefire facilitated by Qatar and Turkey.

Both governments have issued sharply differing casualty claims and said they inflicted heavy losses on the other. The claims could not be independently verified.

Afghanistan’s Defense Ministry said overnight that 55 Pakistani soldiers had been killed, including some whose bodies were taken into Afghanistan, and that “several others were captured alive.” It said eight Afghan soldiers were killed and 11 wounded. The ministry said it destroyed 19 Pakistani army posts and two bases and that the fighting ended around midnight, about four hours after it began Thursday.

Pakistan’s Information Minister Attaullah Tarar said two Pakistani soldiers were killed and three wounded.

Mosharraf Ali Zaidi, a spokesperson for Pakistan's Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, denied that any Pakistani soldiers had been captured. In a post on X, he said at least 133 Afghan fighters were killed and more than 200 wounded. He also said 27 Afghan posts were destroyed and nine fighters captured. He did not specify where the casualties occurred but said additional losses were estimated in strikes on military targets in Kabul, Paktia and Kandahar.