Pakistan airstrikes in Afghanistan kill civilians, UNAMA says, as Islamabad claims militants hit

Pakistan carried out overnight airstrikes in Afghanistan’s Kunar and Helmand provinces, producing sharply conflicting casualty claims on Oct. 1 as the neighbours’ border fight flared again after months of relative calm. Afghanistans Taliban government said the raids destroyed three houses and killed at least nine people — all women and children — and wounded 11 more, according to chief spokesperson Zabihullah Mujahid. The United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) said it had confirmed at least 10 civilian deaths, most of them children, and nine injuries in airstrikes, without naming the attacker; no other country has claimed recent aerial attacks on Afghan soil. Al Jazeera and Reuters could not independently verify either side’s toll. Pakistan’s Ministry of Information offered a different account: “well planned and calibrated” strikes based on credible intelligence against camps and hideouts used by the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and the Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA), with initial reports of 22 militants killed and large stores of weapons destroyed. Islamabad says the threat to Pakistan “emanates from Afghanistan”; Kabul denies harbouring cross-border fighters and called the raids aggression. UNAMA has already counted more than 1,100 civilian deaths and injuries in Afghanistan this year from cross-border hostilities. The episode sharpens a pattern of retaliatory Pakistani strikes after attacks inside Pakistan — and puts pressure on both capitals, and on mediators, to reopen dialogue before another cycle of civilian harm locks in. Sources: Reuters; Al Jazeera; CBS News.