Tensions high after Pakistan launches cross-border attacks into Afghanistan

Taliban claims to have fired across border following air raids targeting Pakistani Taliban.

Islamabad, Pakistan: Pakistan has launched overnight air attacks inside Afghanistan, while the Taliban claimed hours later to have fired across the border.

Tensions flared on Monday between Islamabad and Kabul following the overnight raids. Pakistan said the attack had targeted armed groups hiding out in border regions. The Taliban said eight women and children were killed.

The Afghan defence ministry claimed later on Monday to have fired across the border at Pakistan positions. Islamabad has not yet commented on the claim.

Pakistani military and foreign ministry sources confirmed to Al Jazeera that the “retaliatory” attacks had targeted the hideouts of commanders of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), or Pakistani Taliban, due to “terrorist activities being sponsored and conducted from across border”.

They offered few details. However, on Saturday, a group of suicide bombers targeted a military check post in Pakistan’s North Waziristan district in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, which neighbours Afghanistan, killing seven soldiers.

Afghanistan’s interim government said the Pakistani jets had hit the houses of “ordinary people” in Paktika and Khost provinces. They reported that at least eight people were killed; five women and three children.

In a statement issued on X, government spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said the individual Pakistan claimed to have targeted continues to live in Pakistan.

Kabul “strongly condemns” the “reckless action” which is a violation of Afghanistan territory, he continued.

“The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, which has a long experience of freedom struggle against the superpowers of the world, does