Pakistan claimed early Friday that its forces had killed at least 133 Taliban members in cross-border strikes inside Afghanistan, as it responded to Taliban border attacks.
Mosharraf Zaidi, a spokesman for Pakistan prime minister on foreign media, said in an update issued at 3:45 a.m. that Pakistani counterstrikes against what he described as Taliban military targets in Afghanistan were continuing.
“A total of 133 Afghan Taliban are confirmed killed, more than 200 wounded,” Zaidi said, adding that additional casualties were estimated in strikes on targets in Kabul, Paktia and Kandahar.
He said 27 Taliban posts had been destroyed and nine captured. The strikes, he added, had also destroyed two corps headquarters, three brigade headquarters, two ammunition depots, one logistics base, three battalion headquarters, two sector headquarters and more than 80 tanks, artillery pieces and armored personnel carriers.
Pakistan described the operations as an “immediate and effective response to aggression.”
The claims could not be independently verified, and the Taliban have not confirmed the figures. In statements issued earlier, Taliban said they had carried out retaliatory attacks against Pakistani military positions, claiming to have killed 55 Pakistani soldiers and seized multiple outposts along the border. Pakistan has not acknowledged those reported losses.
The sharp exchange follows Pakistani airstrikes last weekend in eastern Afghanistan, including parts of Nangarhar and Paktika provinces. Pakistani officials said those strikes targeted hideouts of Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan, or TTP, and the Islamic State’s Khorasan affiliate, which Islamabad accuses of operating from Afghanistan’s soil. Taliban rejected that assertion and said civilians were killed.
The United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan has reported at least 13 civilian deaths in recent strikes in Nangarhar, though casualty figures from both sides remain contested.
Relations between the Taliban and the government in Islamabad have deteriorated steadily over the past year, with Pakistan pressing the Taliban to curb militant groups it says are staging attacks inside Pakistan. The Taliban deny allowing Afghanistan’s territory to be used against other countries.
With both sides now reporting heavy casualties and major military damage, the confrontation appears to have moved beyond sporadic border skirmishes into a broader and more dangerous phase of conflict.
