Pakistan Kills 29 Militants in Afghan Border Strikes After Karachi Attack Kills 3 Soldiers
Updated
Updated · The Associated Press · Jun 28
Pakistan Kills 29 Militants in Afghan Border Strikes After Karachi Attack Kills 3 Soldiers
3 articles · Updated · The Associated Press · Jun 28
Summary
Pakistani forces said they killed 29 militants Sunday in a ground operation and calibrated strikes on hideouts and safe havens along the Afghan border.
The operation was launched after multiple militant attacks across Pakistan, including Saturday’s assault on the Rangers’ regional headquarters in Karachi that killed three soldiers.
Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, a breakaway faction of the Pakistani Taliban, claimed the Karachi attack, and Pakistan said the latest border operation targeted TTP-linked militants; one captured Karachi assailant was identified as an Afghan national.
The strikes came less than three weeks after Pakistani airstrikes in Afghanistan and are likely to deepen tensions with Kabul, which denies Islamabad’s accusation that it shelters militants.
Five years after the US withdrawal, has Afghanistan's 'terrorist hotbed' become Pakistan's unsolvable national security crisis?
With Chinese-led peace talks failing, is the Pakistan-Afghanistan border spiraling into an unavoidable, open-ended war?
From Karachi Attack to Open War: The 2026 Pakistan-Afghanistan Escalation and Its Humanitarian Toll
Overview
In June 2026, Karachi faced its first major militant attack since October 2024, when two Chinese engineers were killed in a suicide bombing. The recent strike led authorities to advise residents to stay indoors and caused power outages in several areas. In response, Pakistan’s military launched sanitization operations to clear any remaining militants linked to the attack. This incident occurred amid rising tensions between Pakistan and Afghanistan, highlighting the ongoing security crisis and the complex regional dynamics fueling instability and violence.