Afghanistan death toll in ‘Pakistan strikes’ rises to at least 47
- 04- 18- 2022 09:09 AM
Demonstrators take part in a protest against Pakistani airstrikes, in Khost on April 16, 2022. At least five children and a woman were killed in an eastern Afghan province when Pakistani military forces fired rockets along the border in a pre-dawn assault Saturday, an official and a resident said. AFPPIXKABUL: The death toll from Pakistani military air strikes in the eastern Afghanistan provinces of Khost and Kunar has jumped to at least 47, officials said Sunday, as Islamabad urged Kabul to act against militants launching attacks from Afghan soil.
Border tensions between Pakistan and Afghanistan have risen since the Taliban seized power last year, with Islamabad claiming militant groups are carrying out regular attacks from the neighbouring country.
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The Taliban deny harbouring Pakistani militants, but are also infuriated by a fence Islamabad is erecting along their 2,700-kilometre (1,600-mile) border.
Tensions between the two neighbours deepened after Saturday's pre-dawn air assault which Afghan officials now claim was carried out by Pakistani military helicopters.
The air strikes hit residential houses in Khost and Kunar along the border, Afghan officials said. Earlier officials had said Pakistani forces had fired rockets.
“Forty-one civilians, mainly women and children, were killed and 22 others were wounded in air strikes by Pakistani forces near the Durand line in Khost province,“ Shabir Ahmad Osmani, director of information and culture in Khost told AFP.
Najibullah, an official with the Ministry for Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice in Khost said the death toll in the province was 48.
“Twenty-four people were killed from one family itself.
