Pakistan carried out a ground operation and strikes along its border with Afghanistan, the Pakistani information minister said on Sunday.

The operation was launched in response to "recent multiple terrorist incidents inside Pakistan," Information Minister Attaullah Tarar said in a post on X late Sunday.

It was "followed by calibrated strikes in the border region against the hideouts and safe havens of terrorists," Tarar added. 

Tarar said at least 29 militants were killed in the strikes, including a senior commander.

His post included a blurred but graphic image purportedly showing the dead commander.

Afghan Taliban condemn 'cowardly' and 'brutal' attacks on civilians

On Monday, Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said that airstrikes hit Paktika, Paktia and Kunar provinces. Mujahid condemned the Pakistani military actions as a "cowardly act of aggression" and an "act of brutality" in an X post.

Afghan Taliban deputy spokesman Hamdullah Fitrat later posted on X that the Pakistani attacks had killed and injured scores of civilians, not militants.

Fitrat said Pakistani forces killed an elderly man and a child in Paktia province's Chamkani district, for instance, then struck again when rescuers arrived, killing 28 villagers and injuring 158 more.

He said six more people, mostly women and children, were killed by Pakistani forces when they targeted a home in Paktika province.

In all, Fitrat said 36 civilians had been killed and 163 injured in the overnight attacks.

Strikes are the latest incident of cross-border violence 

The strikes come a day after a bomb and gun attack in the southern port city of Karachi killed three paramilitary troops.

Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, a breakaway faction of the Pakistani Taliban, known as Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, or TTP, claimed responsibility for the Karachi attack.

The Pakistani Taliban are a separate militant group but are allied with the Afghan Taliban.

Islamabad accuses the Taliban of harboring militants who carry out deadly attacks inside Pakistan.

The Afghan Taliban, which seized power in neighboring Afghanistan in 2021, denies the accusation.

Pakistan and Afghanistan have seen their ties spiral into deadly armed conflict in recent months. 

Why Pakistan is fighting the Taliban it once backed

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Edited by: Kieran Burke

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