Afghanistan’s permanent mission to the United Nations said it had formally lodged a complaint with the UN Security Council over Pakistani airstrikes carried out late Saturday in eastern Afghanistan, calling the attacks a serious violation of the country’s sovereignty.
“We strongly condemn the Pakistani airstrikes on Afghan territory conducted on 21–22 February, which resulted in the tragic loss of civilian lives, including women and children,” Naseer Faiq, Afghanistan’s chargé d’affaires to the United Nations, said in a statement.
“Today, the Permanent Mission of Afghanistan formally submitted a complaint to the United Nations Security Council regarding this serious violation,” he added. He called for an immediate halt to such actions, an impartial investigation, and full respect for Afghanistan’s territorial integrity in accordance with the UN Charter and international law.
Pakistani fighter jets struck areas in the districts of Khogyani, Ghani Khil and Behsud in Nangarhar Province, as well as Barmal district in Paktika Province, around midnight on Feb. 21, according to Afghan officials.
The Taliban’s Defense Ministry said it would deliver a “calculated response at an appropriate time,” accusing Pakistan of targeting civilian and religious sites. The ministry described the strikes as repeated acts of aggression that would not conceal what it called Pakistan’s internal security failures.
Pakistani officials, however, claimed the airstrikes targeted hideouts of Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and the Islamic State’s Khorasan branch inside Afghan territory, claiming that nearly 70 militants were killed.
The Taliban have rejected that account, describing the strikes as attacks on civilians. They claimed that more than 20 civilians, including women and children, were killed in Behsud district alone.
Pakistan’s Ministry of Information previously said the strikes were retaliatory and carried out in response to recent suicide and car bomb attacks inside Pakistan, including assaults on a Shiite mosque in Islamabad and attacks in Bajaur and Bannu during Ramadan. Both TTP and the Islamic State’s Khorasan branch claimed responsibility for those attacks.
