Pakistan Strikes Ten Sites Inside Afghanistan After Drone Attacks
Pakistani aircraft hit ten locations in Afghanistan that Islamabad said were used to launch and store drones, after air defences intercepted drones launched from Afghan territory on Wednesday. The strikes fell on several areas of south-eastern Khost province; a spokesman for the provincial governor, Mustaghfir Gurbaz, said there were no casualties. Pakistan’s information minister Attaullah Tarar warned that “any further provocative act by Afghan Taliban will be responded with firm and resolute response”.
The exchange has been escalating for a fortnight: a suicide attack on a police facility in north-western Pakistan killed at least twenty-four last week, Islamabad said it killed twenty-eight militants in border strikes earlier this week, and the Taliban said three civilians died. The worst episode remains March, when a Pakistani airstrike on Kabul killed more than 400 people; the Taliban said it hit a drug rehabilitation centre and Islamabad denied it. What has changed is the weapon — drones launched from Afghan soil at a nuclear-armed neighbour, which converts a border insurgency problem into something closer to interstate conflict. Pakistan is also the mediator Iran has leaned on in the Gulf. Watch for a Taliban casualty claim, which has previously followed within a day.