Midnight op & a warning: Intense border clashes between Pak & Taliban forces — 10 things to know

Along the jagged spine of the Pakistan-Afghanistan border, wherever generations person grown up knowing the dependable of gunfire and the shadiness of conflict, tensions flared again arsenic aggravated clashes broke retired connected Saturday night.

Taliban forces struck astatine Pakistani posts, and successful return, Pakistan’s subject fired back, turning a agelong of mountains and valleys into different arena of conflict.Earlier successful the week, Afghan authorities accused Pakistan of bombing the capital, Kabul, and a marketplace successful the country’s east. Pakistan did not assertion work for the assault.Here are 10 things to know:

_{What Pakistan claimed}

1. The unit began erstwhile Taliban forces allegedly opened occurrence connected respective Pakistani borderline posts precocious Saturday.2. The firing took spot astatine respective cardinal posts, including Angoor Adda, Bajaur, Kurram, Dir, Chitral successful Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and Baramcha successful Balochistan, The Express Tribune reported, arsenic cited by the quality bureau ANI.3. Pakistan Security sources said that the firing was aimed astatine facilitating the amerciable introduction of Khwarij -- the state-designated word for the banned Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) -- into Pakistani territory, arsenic reported by The Express Tribune.

4, "The counteroffensive efficaciously targeted and destroyed aggregate Afghan posts astatine border. Dozens of Afghan soldiers and Khwarij were killed successful retaliatory fire," quality bureau ANI reported, citing Express Tribune.5. Pakistani Minister of Interior Mohsin Naqvi called the Afghan attacks "unprovoked" and said that Pakistani forces were responding "with a chromatic for each brick". "Firing by Afghan forces connected civilian colonisation is simply a blatant usurpation of planetary laws.

Pakistan’s brave forces person fixed a punctual and effectual effect that nary provocation volition beryllium tolerated," helium said successful a station connected X.

_{What Taliban said}

6. Afghanistan’s Taliban forces said they launched equipped reprisals against Pakistani soldiers on the border, accusing Islamabad of aerial strikes connected their soil.7. "In retaliation for aerial strikes carried retired by the Pakistani service connected Kabul," Taliban forces are engaged "in dense clashes against Pakistani information forces successful assorted areas" on the border, the Afghan subject said successful a statement, arsenic citeb by AFP.8. Later, Taliban defence ministry spokesperson Enayat Khowarazm told quality bureau AFP the "successful" operations had ended astatine midnight. But helium warned: "If the opposing broadside violates Afghanistan's territory again, our equipped forces are acceptable to support their territory and volition respond firmly."

_{Bone of contention: TTP}

9. Pakistan did not admit carrying retired Thursday's attacks but urged Kabul "to halt harbouring the Pakistani Taliban (TTP) connected its soil."10. The TTP, which has received combat grooming successful Afghanistan and shares the Afghan Taliban’s ideology, is accused by Pakistan of sidesplitting hundreds of its soldiers since 2021.The heightened tensions from Pakistan travel arsenic Afghanistan’s overseas minister, Amir Khan Muttaqi, is connected a week-long sojourn to India, marking the archetypal high-level travel from Kabul since the Taliban took powerfulness successful August 2021.