Pakistan airstrikes in Afghanistan kill civilians, Taliban says 36 dead
Pakistan's overnight strikes in eastern Afghanistan left at least 28 civilians dead, UNAMA said, as the Taliban put the toll at 36 and both sides traded blame.
United Nations officials said Pakistan's overnight airstrikes in eastern Afghanistan killed at least 28 civilians and wounded 49, while the Taliban said the same attacks left 36 civilians dead and more than 160 injured. Women and children were among the victims, and one account described children, women and elderly people sleeping in a house when it was struck.
The Taliban said the strikes hit civilian homes in Paktia, Paktika and Kunar provinces, including the village of Mandokhail in Chamkani district. Pakistan said its ground and air operations were aimed at militant hideouts used by the Tehrik-e Taliban Pakistan, and later said the border operation killed at least 29 militants, including four fighters linked to Jamaat-ul-Ahrar.
Pakistan said the assault was launched in response to a string of militant attacks inside its own territory, including attacks on the Pakistan Rangers. The clash quickly became another dispute over who was killed and where, with Kabul describing dead civilians in family compounds and Islamabad insisting it had struck armed groups operating along the frontier.
The violence is the latest rupture in a conflict that has moved from scattered border skirmishes to sustained retaliation since a ceasefire reached in October 2025 collapsed. Fighting erupted again in late February 2026, and United Nations experts have said that since February 26 there have been at least 289 civilian casualties in Afghanistan, including 76 killed and 213 injured, with more than 115,000 people displaced.
The pattern has repeated before. Pakistan carried out airstrikes earlier in June that it said killed militants, while Afghan officials said civilians died, deepening the cycle in which one side counts militants and the other counts families buried under collapsed walls. Each new strike has widened the humanitarian toll far beyond the border area, where displaced civilians, damaged homes and disputed casualty figures now define the conflict as much as the battlefield itself.
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