Defence Ministry said on Saturday that its forces hit several points inside Pakistan in retaliation for deadly airstrikes last week. Pakistan lastTuesday launched an operation to destroy a training facility and kill insurgents in Afghanistan’s eastern Paktika province. The strikes killed dozens of people, mostly women and children. Comments from the Taliban Defence Ministry on Saturday, posted on X, said its forces targeted Pakistani points that “served as centres and hideouts for malicious elements and their supporters who organised and coordinated attacks in Afghanistan.” The ministry spokesman, Enayatullah Khwarzami, gave no further information about the strikes, including how they were carried out and if there were any casualties on either side.

 

The statement further said, the attacks were conducted“beyond the “hypothetical line” - an expression used by Afghan authorities to refer to a border with Pakistan which has been in dispute since long. A pro-Taliban media outlet, ‘Hurriyet Daily News’, reported Ministry sources as saying that the strikes killed 19 Pakistani troops and that three Afghan civilians died in the violence. No one from Pakistan’s Foreign Ministry was immediately available for comment. “Clarity! Several points on the other side of the virtual line “Durand” in the south-eastern direction of the country were targeted, which were hideouts andcenters for evil elements and their supporters, who were organizing attacks in Afghanistan,” Taliban said in a post on X. Pakistani officials have accused the Taliban of not doing enough to combat cross-border militant activity, a charge the Taliban Government denies, saying it does not allow anyone to carry out attacks against any country from its soil. Afghanistan has rejected the Durand Line, a border between Pakistan and Afghanistan, which was drawn by the Britishers in the 19th century, as per ‘Al Jazeera’. The Taliban sees it as a divisive line between Pashtuns on both sides of the border.