Pakistani airstrikes in Kunar and Paktika kill three civilians
Sources linked to the Taliban administration have confirmed that the Pakistani army carried out airstrikes early Monday on areas in Kunar and Paktika provinces, strikes that, according to these sources, killed at least three civilians and wounded several others in Kunar’s Nurgal district.
According to Taliban officials, around 2:30 a.m., Pakistani fighter jets bombed a residential house in the village of Patan in Nurgal district, Kunar province. Based on the same information, the victims of the attack were civilians.
The Taliban administration also said that around 4:00 a.m., Pakistani warplanes targeted parts of Barmal district in Paktika province. Media affiliated with the Taliban administration reported that in these strikes, an empty shop in the Turkandi area and an uninhabited old house in the Rakha area were completely destroyed.
Pakistani officials had not commented on the attacks at the time of publication. However, the incident comes as insecurity and deadly clashes inside Pakistan have intensified.
On Sunday, the Pakistani army said that following a fierce clash between the country’s security forces and armed men in Hangu district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, six Pakistani soldiers, including two officers, were killed. The Pakistani army called the attackers members of “Fitna al-Khawarij,” a term Pakistani officials use for Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan and its affiliated groups.
Separately, sources said the suicide bomber in Friday’s attack on a police compound in the Pakistani city of Kohat was a resident of Sangin district in Helmand province. Pakistan’s Ministry of Information and Broadcasting had previously claimed in a statement that the attackers in the assault on worshippers and police in Kohat, in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, had roots in Afghanistan.
Pakistan has previously carried out several airstrikes on Afghan border areas. Islamabad has consistently claimed that the strikes target militant centers, especially members of Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, a group Pakistani officials say is sheltering inside Afghanistan.
