Pakistani air operations hit a drug rehabilitation hospital in Kabul, killing or wounding an unspecified number of people, an Afghan Taliban spokesperson said on Monday, according to the Taliban's public statements. Islamabad rejected the characterization that a medical facility was struck, saying instead that its strikes were directed at "military installations" and infrastructure supporting militants.
Pakistan's Ministry of Information and Broadcasting posted on the social media platform X that the country's forces targeted "military installations" and "terrorist support infrastructure" in both Kabul and Afghanistan's eastern province of Nangarhar. The ministry's statement said the locations struck included facilities that hosted ammunition and equipment used by Afghan Taliban militants and fighters Pakistan refers to as "Fitna al-Khawarij," a term Islamabad applies to militants.
Requests for immediate comment from Pakistan's military were not answered at the time the statement was made public. The ministry's post on X served as Islamabad's principal public explanation for the operation.
Violence between the two neighboring countries escalated last month when Pakistan launched airstrikes in Afghanistan that Islamabad described as strikes against militant strongholds. Afghanistan's government called those strikes a violation of its sovereignty and responded with its own attacks, marking a period of reciprocal cross-border action.
The issue of militancy has been a persistent point of contention between the two sides. Pakistan has repeatedly said that militants use Afghan territory as a haven to launch attacks inside Pakistan. The Taliban have rejected that charge, stating that addressing militancy is an internal matter for Pakistan.
The Kabul hospital strike and Islamabad's statement came amid this broader context of mutual accusations and recent cross-border military activity. The Taliban's assertion of casualties at a medical facility contrasts with Pakistan's public account that the strikes were focused on military and militant-related targets in Kabul and Nangarhar.
Beyond the immediate statements from both sides, the situation remains uncertain: details on the number of casualties from the reported hospital strike were not provided in the statements available, and the Pakistani military did not immediately provide further comment when asked.
Given the limited and conflicting public accounts, independent verification of the precise nature of the targets and the scale of any casualties was not available at the time of the statements. The incident sits within a recent pattern of cross-border operations and retaliatory strikes, underscoring continuing tensions between Islamabad and Kabul over militants and territorial sovereignty.