Pakistan carries out airstrikes in Afghanistan: How Islamabad-Taliban ties have deteriorated

All is not well at the Pakistan-Afghanistan border. In fact, ties between the two countries have been deteriorating in recent times and it’s bound to worsen after Monday’s (18 March) incident. Islamabad confirmed it had carried out “intelligence-based anti-terrorist operations” in the neighbouring country, which ended up killing eight citizens. In response, the Taliban government fired at Pakistani troops along the border.

Now, tensions are peaking between the two nations, with Pakistan accusing Afghanistan of sheltering terrorists and the Taliban denying the charge. In fact, this will be another chapter in the long-standing tensions between the Pakistan government and the Taliban in Afghanistan.

But what exactly happened on Monday? And how does this incident affect already strained relations between Islamabad and Kabul?

Monday’s airstrikes and resulting crossfire

In the wee hours of Monday (18 March), Pakistan launched two airstrikes in the Paktika and Khost provinces in eastern Afghanistan. According to Taliban officials, these strikes killed at least eight people, including three children.

Zabihullah Mujahid, a spokesperson for the Taliban government, confirming the incident, warned Pakistan not to “blame Afghanistan for the lack of control and problems in its own territory”. “Such incidents can have very bad consequences which will not be in Pakistan’s control,” he added.

Hours later, the Pakistan Foreign Office too confirmed the strikes, saying it had carried out “intelligence-based anti-terrorist operations” inside the border regions of Afghanistan. It further added that terrorists belonging to the Hafiz Gul Bahadur Group were the prime targets of its operation.

It said that these terrorists along with the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) was responsible for multiple terrorist attacks inside Pakistan, resulting in “deaths of hundreds of civilians and law enforcement officials”.

Hours later, the Taliban condemned the attacks. Taliban spokesperson Zabihullah Mujahid wrote, “The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan strongly condemns these attacks and calls this reckless action a violation of Afghanistan’s territory. The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, which has a long experience of freedom struggle against the superpowers of the world, does not allow anyone to invade its territory.”

Furthermore, it also launched heavy weapons at Pakistani forces near its border. The Afghan defence ministry said, “In response to that aggression, the border forces of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan targeted military bases of Pakistan’s army across the artificial Durand Line with heavy weapons.”

The Afghan foreign ministry also summoned Pakistan’s charge d’affaires and sent him a letter of protest against the incident.

Immediate cause of airstrikes

Pakistan’s airstrikes on Monday come after an attack in North Waziristan last Saturday killed seven Pakistani soldiers. President Asif Ali Zardari vowed retaliation for the attack.

At the funeral of two of the officers, he had stated that the blood of the martyrs would not go in vain and the country would avenge them. The president said Pakistan would not hesitate to strike back if attacked by anyone at borders or inside its territory.

The TTP and Pakistan

Such strikes along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border isn’t a new thing, though. In the recent years, attacks by the TTP , a globally designated terrorist group and considered a close ally of the ruling Taliban in Kabul, have increased on Pakistani soil.

In fact, in 2023, the nation witnessed a 17 per cent spike in terrorist violence with a total of 306 terrorist attacks which killed 693 people, according to Pakistan Institute for Peace Studies. The report further said that militants’ intensifying attacks indicate that the TTP and its affiliates will continue to resort to an intensified terrorism onslaught with a view to ‘force’ Pakistan to reinstate the process of dialogue.

The country has seen attack after attack in the past year, dating back to January. It was then that a suicide bomber, belonging to Jamaat-ul-Ahrar which is a faction of the TTP, blew himself up inside a crowded mosque in a highly fortified security compound in the north-western city Peshawar on 30 January, killing at least 100 people, mostly policemen, while 57 people were injured.

This was followed by an attack in July at the Zhob Garrison in Balochistan. At least 23 soldiers were killed in the attack.

In November last year, terrorists belonging to a TTP faction had also attacked the Pakistan Air Force’s Mianwali Training Air Base , some 300 km from Lahore, damaging three grounded aircraft. All the attackers were killed in the army operation, which came a day after 17 soldiers were killed in three separate terror strikes.

In light of these attacks, Pakistan has also held multiple rounds of talks with its counterparts in Kabul, with the latest engagement occurring in early January when Islamabad hosted a high-powered Taliban delegation. But neither side reported any breakthrough, nor has the diplomatic effort brought about a reduction in TTP-led extremist.

Other factors in strained ties

However, the TTP isn’t the only reason for deteriorating ties between Pakistan and Afghanistan. Islamabad’s decision to expel over 1.5 million Afghan refugees and migrants last November has also been a thorn in the relationship between the two neighbouring nations.

At the time, Bilal Karimi, spokesperson for the Afghan government, had been quoted as saying, “This is injustice, an injustice that cannot be ignored in any way. The forced expulsion of people is in conflict with all the norms of good neighbourliness.”

There’s also the concern in Islamabad that the Taliban is trying to cosy up to India. On 7 March, an Indian delegation led by Joint Secretary JP Singh in the Ministry of External Affairs held extensive meetings with Taliban foreign minister Amir Khan Muttaqi. The meetings explored expansion in bilateral Afghan-India relations, especially economic and transit matters.

Following this meet, Singh had been quoted as saying that New Delhi was interested in expanding political and economic cooperation with Afghanistan. This India-Taliban engagement is ruffling feathers in Pakistan, especially among its military circle.

With inputs from agencies