Pakistan has declared “open war” with the Taliban-led Afghanistan after the two governments escalated deadly attacks on each other.
Pakistan bombed Afghanistan’s two biggest cities, Kabul and Kandahar, and the border province of Paktia in the early hours of Friday, according to Pakistan’s Information Minister Attaullah Tarar. Hours later, Tarar said there were drone attacks in three Pakistani cities—Abbotabad, Swabi, and Nowshera—which he blamed on the Taliban. He said there was “no damage to life.”
[time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”]Pakistan’s attack came shortly after Afghan forces attacked Pakistani border troops, which the Taliban said was in retaliation for Pakistani strikes over the weekend. Casualty counts have greatly varied: Pakistan claimed at least 133 Taliban officials were killed and 200 wounded in Friday’s attack, while Afghanistan said that there were no reported casualties.
“Our cup of patience has overflowed. Now it is open war between us and you,” Pakistan’s Defense Minister Khawaja Asif posted on X hours after Pakistan launched its strikes. Asif blamed the Taliban for turning Afghanistan into “a proxy for India,” which warred with Pakistan in May last year. Asif accused the Taliban of gathering “all the terrorists of the world in Afghanistan” and “exporting terrorism.”
The Taliban confirmed that Pakistan’s strikes had hit the three locations. Early Friday, Taliban spokesperson Zabiullah Mujahid posted on X, “The cowardly Pakistani army has bombed some places in Kabul, Kandahar, and Paktia. Praise be to God, no one was harmed.”
Former Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai said on X that Afghanistan “will defend their beloved homeland with complete unity in all circumstances and will respond to aggression with courage.”
The latest strikes and declaration of war, coming after the two countries have traded attacks in recent days, appear to shatter a fragile cease-fire that has been in place since October. In mid-October, the two neighbors that share 1,600-mile mountainous border called the Durand Line traded air strikes and were locked into intense border clashes and ground fighting, which killed at least 47 civilians in Afghanistan, according to a U.N. report, as well as soldiers on either side, although reported casualty counts differ.
It also marks one of the biggest escalations in outright hostilities between Pakistan and Afghanistan since 2021 and could be the start of more violence. Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said in a statement that Pakistan’s armed forces will “under no circumstances allow the peace and security of the country to be compromised” and are “fully capable of crushing any aggressive intentions.”
Here’s what to know about the latest attack, past clashes, and why the South Asian countries are fighting.
Trading attacks
Pakistan’s strikes on Afghanistan occurred early on Friday, with the first being carried out at around 1:50 a.m. local time (3:50 p.m. E.T.) and followed by a second air raid, according to Al Jazeera. Tarar announced that the operation, dubbed “Operation Ghazab Lil Haq” or “Wrath for the Truth,” concluded at 3:40 a.m. local time (5:40 p.m. E.T.). In addition to the number of casualties, which is disputed by Afghanistan, Tarar said the operation destroyed 27 Taliban positions and took control of another nine positions.
The locations targeted by Pakistan are significant. Kabul is Afghanistan’s capital and largest city with a population of around six million, while Kandahar is home to the Taliban’s supreme leader, Sheikh Haibatullah Akhundzada.
An Afghan official also said that civilians were wounded in Pakistani attacks on Thursday when a mortar shell hit a camp near the Torkham border crossing which housed people returning from Pakistan, according to AFP.
Clashes have continued into Friday evening local time, according to reporting on the ground by Al Jazeera.
The strike followed days of renewed clashes between the two countries.
Over the weekend, Pakistan carried out strikes on seven camps allegedly belonging to the Pakistani Taliban—also known as Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP)—and an Islamic State (ISIS)-affiliated group located in the Afghanistan provinces of Nangarhar and Paktika, according to Pakistan’s Ministry of Information & Broadcasting. Kabul said the strikes had hit civilian homes and a religious school and killed at least 18 people. The airstrikes killed at least 13 civilians in Afghanistan, according to the U.N. mission in Afghanistan. Pakistan claimed that the airstrikes killed at least 80 militants.
Islamabad has accused Kabul of hosting groups, including TTP, that have carried out recent terrorist attacks in Pakistan. The Taliban have publicly denied hosting TTP and other terrorist groups.
Citing a series of suicide bombing attacks this month, including an attack on Feb. 6 that killed more than 30 people at a mosque in Islamabad, the information ministry said in a Feb. 21 statement that it had “conclusive evidence” that the acts were perpetrated by militants at the “behest of their Afghanistan-based leadership and handlers.” The ministry also asserted that the Taliban has “failed to undertake any substantive action against” terrorist groups based in Afghanistan.
On Thursday evening, Afghanistan’s military launched an offensive across its shared border with Pakistan in what the Taliban said was retaliation for the weekend airstrikes. The country’s Defense Ministry said its attacks, launched at around 8 p.m. local time (10:30 a.m. E.T.) and ending at midnight, targeted six provinces along the Durand Line. Taliban spokesperson Hamdullah Fitrat said Afghan forces had killed 55 Pakistani soldiers and captured others in the attack, and took control of 19 Pakistani military outposts, according to CNN. Eight Afghan soldiers were killed and 11 injured in the border clash, according to Afghanistan’s Defence Ministry.
Casualty counts also differed after Thursday’s attacks, with Pakistan’s Tarar claiming much fewer casualties. He said just two Pakistani soldiers were killed and three injured.
“After the defeat in the field, the Afghan Taliban regime is resorting to lies and propaganda,” Tarar posted early Friday.
Pakistan cast its Friday strikes as retaliation for the Thursday clashes. “Afghan Taliban miscalculated and opened unprovoked fire on multiple locations across Pakistan Afghanistan border in [Khyber Pakhtunkhwa], which is being met with immediate and effective response by Pakistan’s security forces,” Pakistan’s information ministry posted at 1:27 a.m. local time (3:27 p.m. E.T.) on Friday, minutes before Pakistan bombed Afghanistan. “Taliban regime forces are being delivered punishment in Chitral, Khyber, Mohmand, Kurram and Bajaur sectors.”
Strained relations
Afghanistan and Pakistan were once close allies. For two decades from the toppling of the first Taliban regime by U.S. forces in 2001 to the Taliban’s return to power in 2021, Pakistan hosted Taliban leaders and fighters as they waged a sustained campaign against a U.S.-led coalition to reassert their power in Afghanistan. Pakistan and the Taliban had such warm ties that India, which shares a border with both countries, long considered the Taliban a proxy of Pakistan. After the Taliban takeover in August 2021, which followed the withdrawal of U.S. and NATO troops, Pakistan’s then-Interior Minister Sheikh Rasheed Ahmed predicted the formation of a “new bloc,” signaling a new era for stronger Pakistani-Afghan relations.
But relations have turned cold and conflict has run hot since then. The Taliban does not recognize the Durand Line as the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan, which Islamabad does. The Durand Line, which was created by the British in 1893 and inherited by Pakistan when it became independent in 1947, divides Pashtun and Baloch communities that have traditionally considered the area their homelands. Relations have further frayed as the Taliban draws closer to India, with which Pakistan has fought over the disputed region of Kashmir.
Recent suicide bombings have also reignited Pakistan’s anger with the Taliban for allegedly harbouring and supporting militant groups in Afghanistan that carry out attacks in Pakistan, which the Taliban denies. Last year was Pakistan’s deadliest year in more than a decade, which included a rise in combat-related deaths as well as militant attacks. At least 1,070 violent incidents, including bomb blasts, last year, killed close to 4,000 people in Pakistan, according to the South Asian Terrorism Portal.
Afghan and Pakistani forces have had 75 clashes and Pakistan has carried out at least seven independent airstrikes (including Friday’s strike) on Afghanistan since 2021, Sami Omari, an expert in South and Central Asian security and strategic affairs, told Al Jazeera.
On Oct. 9, Pakistan carried out strikes in Afghan cities, including Kabul, as Islamabad said it was targeting leaders of TTP after an upsurge in terrorist attacks in Pakistan. The Taliban, condemning Pakistan’s attacks as a violation of Afghan sovereignty, retaliated by attacking Pakistani military posts along the Durand Line. Days of fighting brought the deadliest violence between the two countries since 2021, which ended on Oct. 19 when Qatar and Turkey brokered a temporary truce. Negotiations for a more lasting agreement mostly petered out, although earlier this month Saudi Arabia mediated the release of three Pakistani soldiers captured by the Taliban in October.
Pakistan has also deported millions of Afghan migrants without documents since a crackdown in October 2023. Many of them were born in Pakistan and have lived there all their lives.
Asif, in his Friday statement, said Pakistan had taken in millions of Afghan refugees over the last half century and was home to millions of Afghans who earned “their livelihood on our soil.” In 2024, nearly three million Afghan refugees returned to Afghanistan from Iran and Pakistan.
Land border crossings have been mostly closed since October. Deported Afghan nationals were allowed to return to Afghanistan, but officials suspended their repatriation when fighting resumed in recent days.
World leaders call for restraint
Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi called on Pakistan and Afghanistan to seek dialogue with each other and resolve their conflict peacefully. In a Friday post on X, Araghchi said Iran, which maintains a cooperative relationship with both countries, stands ready to “provide any assistance in facilitating dialogue and strengthening understanding and cooperation between the two countries.”
Araghchi pointed to the month of Ramadan, which began this year on Feb. 18 and is the holiest month of the Islamic calendar, as a time for both sides to show restraint.
Russia’s foreign ministry also urged the two countries to stop attacks immediately and seek a diplomatic resolution, according to the RIA news agency. Russia reportedly offered to mediate.
Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said at a regular press conference on Friday that Beijing has also been trying to mediate the conflict through its channels and called for both sides to reach a cease-fire.
Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan reportedly spoke with Afghanistan and Pakistan about the conflict in calls on Friday. Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud, foreign minister for Saudi Arabia, also spoke with his Pakistani counterpart in a call on Friday.
India’s foreign ministry condemned Pakistan’s airstrikes on Afghanistan and called the attack “another attempt by Pakistan to externalise its internal failures,” according to a statement by spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal.
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