Pakistan bombs Kabul in ‘open war’ on Afghanistan’s Taliban government

ISLAMABAD – Pakistan bombed major cities in Afghanistan, including the capital Kabul, on Feb 27, with Islamabad’s defence minister declaring the neighbours at “open war” following months of tit-for-tat clashes.

AFP reporters in Kabul and Kandahar heard blasts and jets overhead until dawn, and the Taliban government said Pakistani surveillance aircraft flew over Afghanistan on the afternoon of Feb 27.

The overnight operation was Pakistan’s most widespread bombardment of the Afghan capital and its first air strikes on the southern power base of the Taliban authorities since they returned to power in 2021.

Near the key Torkham border crossing between the two countries, an AFP journalist heard shelling on the morning of Feb 27, and a camp accommodating Afghans returning from Pakistan was hit by the fighting overnight.

“Children, women and old people were running,” 65-year-old returnee Gander Khan told AFP in front of rows of tents at the Omari camp.

Pakistan’s latest operation came after Afghan forces attacked Pakistani border troops on the night of Feb 26 in retaliation for earlier air strikes by Islamabad.

Taliban government spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said Afghan forces killed 55 Pakistani soldiers and captured several others, while putting the death toll among Afghan troops at 13.

The head of the Pakistan military’s publicity wing, Lieutenant-General Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry, told reporters that “274 Taliban regime members and terrorists” had been killed, against the loss of 12 Pakistani troops.

Casualty claims by both sides are difficult to verify independently.

Relations plunge

Relations between the neighbours have plunged in recent months, with land border crossings largely shut since deadly fighting in October 2025 that killed more than 70 people on both sides.

Islamabad accuses Afghanistan of failing to act against militant groups that carry out attacks in Pakistan, which the Taliban government denies.

Most of the attacks have been claimed by the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), a militant group that has stepped up assaults in Pakistan since the Afghan Taliban returned to power in Kabul in 2021.

Pakistani Defence Minister Khawaja Asif declared an “all-out confrontation” with the Taliban government, posting on X: “Now it is open war between us and you.”

Taliban government spokesman Mr Mujahid said Afghanistan wanted “dialogue” to resolve the conflict.

“We have repeatedly emphasised a peaceful solution, and still want the problem to be resolved through dialogue,” Mr Mujahid told a news conference, adding that “right now, Pakistani planes, reconnaissance aircraft are flying over Afghanistan’s airspace”.

Delicate ceasefire broken

The overnight strikes mark a “significant and dangerous escalation from earlier clashes”, South Asia expert Michael Kugelman said on X.

“Pakistan appears to have expanded its targeting beyond TTP to the Taliban regime itself,” he said.

Several rounds of negotiations followed an initial ceasefire brokered by Qatar and Turkey, but the efforts have failed to produce a lasting agreement.

After repeated breaches of the initial truce, Saudi Arabia intervened in February, mediating the release of three Pakistani soldiers captured by Afghanistan in October 2025.

Iran, which shares an eastern border with Afghanistan and Pakistan, on Feb 27 offered to help “facilitate dialogue”, while the Saudi foreign minister spoke with his Pakistani counterpart and China said it was “working with” both countries while calling for calm.

An AFP reporter in Kandahar, where Supreme Leader Hibatullah Akhundzada is based, also heard jets overnight and drones on the evening of Feb 27.

Streets in Kabul were quiet after daybreak, in keeping with a Friday during Ramadan in the Muslim-majority nation.

At the camp for returnees near Torkham, multiple civilians were wounded in a Pakistan strike, Nangarhar provincial official Qureshi Badlun said.

One woman was killed and several others were hospitalised, according to provincial public health spokesman Naqibullah Rahimi.

Mr Mujahid, the Taliban government spokesman, told AFP that several Pakistani soldiers had been “caught alive”, a claim denied by the prime minister’s office in Islamabad.

The military operation follows

Pakistani strikes on Nangarhar and Paktika provinces

overnight into Feb 22, which the UN mission in Afghanistan said killed at least 13 civilians.

Besides military operations, there have been a series of deadly suicide blasts in Pakistan and Afghanistan in recent months.

These included an attack on a Shi’ite mosque in Islamabad that killed at least 40 people and was claimed by the ISIS terror group.

The militant group’s regional chapter, ISIS-Khorasan, also claimed a deadly suicide bombing at a restaurant in Kabul in January. AFP