Pakistan said it carried out overnight air and ground operations against suspected militants in Afghanistan, claiming that 25 fighters were killed. Information Minister Attaullah Tarar said three targets in the eastern provinces of Paktia, Paktika and Kunar were destroyed in precision strikes.
The Pakistani statement identified Jamaat-ul-Ahrar as the target and described the group as frequently linked to Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan. Tarar said the operation also included action by ground forces in frontier areas. The published report did not contain independent confirmation from Afghanistan, name any of those reported killed or provide a damage assessment for the three sites.
Islamabad said the operation responded to two sources of violence: an attack in Karachi on Saturday that killed three paramilitary personnel and recent incidents in Pakistan's border provinces. The account did not provide evidence directly connecting the people or locations struck in Afghanistan with the Karachi deaths, so that link remains the Pakistani government's stated rationale.
The strikes were the latest in a series of Pakistani attacks on Afghan territory in recent months, including an operation earlier in June. Pakistan accuses Afghanistan's Taliban government of allowing armed groups to shelter across the border and plan an expanding campaign of attacks, particularly by the TTP. The Taliban authorities in Kabul have repeatedly rejected that accusation.
Afghanistan has also said earlier Pakistani strikes killed civilians. No Afghan casualty statement relating specifically to the June 29 operation was included in the available reporting. With the two governments offering conflicting accounts of the presence of militants and the effects of previous attacks, the claimed toll of 25 should be treated as an assertion by Islamabad rather than an independently established result.
The military action took place against a backdrop of severe disruption at the shared frontier. The border had remained largely closed since violence escalated in October, according to the report, halting much of the bilateral trade that normally crosses it. New strikes risked deepening both the security confrontation and the economic cost of the closure for communities and traders on either side.
Tarar's announcement established Pakistan's acknowledgment that it struck targets in three Afghan provinces and conducted ground operations near the border. The statement also identified the claimed target group, motive and casualty figure. What remained unresolved was whether all three sites were military in nature, whether the reported dead were Jamaat-ul-Ahrar members, and whether civilians were harmed. Those questions require evidence beyond the single official account available in published reporting. The report also gave no operational timeline more precise than describing the air and ground actions as overnight.
