Pakistan's security forces killed 16 militants on March 23, 2025, after they tried to cross into the country from Afghanistan near Ghulam Khan, a border town in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, the military said. The operation took place in a remote northwestern area long associated with cross-border militant movement.
The army said the men were Khwarij, the term the government uses for Pakistani Taliban fighters. It accused the Afghan government of failing to prevent militants from using Afghan territory and said Kabul should deny its soil for attacks on Pakistan. Afghanistan denies those accusations.
The AP report placed the raid in the context of a surge in attacks by Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, a separate but allied group of the Afghan Taliban that has been emboldened since the Taliban returned to power in Kabul in 2021. Many TTP leaders and fighters have found sanctuary in Afghanistan, the report said.
The statement came as Pakistan has struggled with repeated militant violence along its border regions. The military said the Afghan side should fulfil its obligations, language that showed how border management remains one of the most combustible issues between the two countries.
The supplied report did not say whether Pakistan suffered any casualties in the clash. It also did not identify the dead militants beyond the army's label for them. The verified outcome was one-sided in the army's account: 16 militants dead and another warning directed at Kabul.
In a region where accusations regularly travel across the frontier faster than fighters do, the latest statement fit a familiar pattern. Pakistan says militants are entering from Afghanistan; Afghanistan denies aiding them; and the cycle of raids and counterclaims continues.
The statement from the military also mirrored a longstanding argument with Kabul. Pakistan says the Taliban government in Afghanistan allows militants to shelter on its side of the frontier; Kabul denies the charge. By naming the dead as Khwarij, the army linked this clash to the broader campaign against Pakistani Taliban fighters, not just a single border incident.
The AP report says the TTP has been emboldened since the Taliban returned to power in 2021, and that many of its leaders and fighters have found sanctuary in Afghanistan. That context makes the latest kill count part of a much bigger security dispute. The military did not report casualties of its own, but the message to Afghanistan was explicit: Pakistan expects more than statements after militants cross the border.
The border fight also sits inside a broader pattern of mistrust. Pakistan wants Kabul to stop militants crossing in from the north-west, while Afghanistan says it is not responsible for attacks inside Pakistan. With the Taliban government back in power since 2021 and the TTP still active, the military statement fit a cycle that has repeated for years: a raid, a death count and another warning across the frontier.
Pakistan did not say whether the militants were intercepted before they crossed fully into the country or whether the encounter happened entirely on the Pakistani side of the frontier. That detail matters, because border incidents in this region often become part of a larger diplomatic argument as soon as the shooting stops.
