Afghanistan accuses Pakistan of deadly air strike on drug rehab centre in Kabul
Firefighters respond after Pakistani air strikes allegedly hit the Secondary Rehabilitation Services Centre in Kabul on March 16. (AFP: Wakil Kohsar)
In short:
The Afghan health ministry says more than 400 people have been killed following strikes across Kabul this week, including one that they claim hit a drug rehab facility.
Pakistan has denied deliberately targeting the facility, saying it conducted precision strikes on military installations.
What's next?
China says envoys are working to mediate the conflict and call for a ceasefire.
Hundreds of people have been killed in an air strike on a drug treatment centre in the Afghan capital, Kabul, with the Taliban accusing Pakistan of carrying out the attack.
Pakistan has denied deliberately targeting the 2,000-bed facility, instead saying it conducted precision strikes on "military installations and terrorist support infrastructure".
The aftermath of an airstrike at a drug rehabilitation hospital in Kabul, Afghanistan. (AP Photo/Siddiqullah Alizai)
The Pakistani military struck Kabul several times in recent weeks, as part of a conflict sparked by claims the Taliban government has harboured extremists who have carried out attacks across the border.
Loud explosions rocked the city at 9pm local time on Monday, prompting anti-aircraft fire and forcing locals to run for cover in panic as they were out and about after breaking their daily Ramadan fast.
Afghan medical staff load a body onto an ambulance. (AFP: Wakil Kohsar)
Once anti-aircraft guns stopped at about 10pm, fleets of ambulances and firefighters were brought to the rehabilitation centre to douse flames in burning and destroyed buildings.
A spokesperson for the Taliban Interior Ministry, Abdul Mateen Qanie, said 408 people had been killed and 265 injured.
A member of the rescue team working at the site, Allah Mohammad Farooq, also said hundreds had been killed.
Another Taliban government spokesman, Zabihullah Mujahid, condemned the strike on X, saying Pakistan had "once again violated Afghan territory", calling the strikes "a crime" and an "act of inhumanity".
Taliban security personnel carry a body on a blanket at the site of a damaged building. (AFP: Wakil Kohsar)
Afghan director of Italian non-government organisation Emergency, Dejan Panic, said it had received three bodies after the strike on Monday night and was treating 27 wounded.
'No off-ramps'
Long-running cross-border clashes between Afghanistan and Pakistan escalated in October last year, leaving dozens dead, but after subsiding, they resumed last month, with Pakistan describing the conflict as "open war".
On Friday, the United Nations mission in Afghanistan confirmed the deaths of at least 75 civilians in the country since clashes with Pakistan intensified on February 26.
Pakistan said it also hit targets on Monday in the eastern border province of Nangarhar, which was also being used "against innocent Pakistani civilians".
"Pakistan's targeting is precise and carefully undertaken to ensure no collateral damage is inflicted," the information ministry said.
Omid Stanikzai, 31, a security guard at the drug treatment centre, said he "heard the sound of the jet patrolling".
"There were military units all around us. When these military units fired on the jet, the jet dropped bombs and a fire broke out," Mr Stanikzai said.
"All of the dead and injured were civilians."
China said on Monday that its special envoy had spent a week mediating between the two sides and had urged an immediate ceasefire.
But South Asia expert Michael Kugelman, from the international affairs think-tank Atlantic Council, said the fighting showed little sign of ending soon.
"The Arab Gulf nations that mediated previous rounds of Afghanistan-Pakistan talks are now bogged down by their own war,"Mr Kugelman said.
"Other mediators, including China, have had limited success."
Smoke and flames rise from an area hit by airstrikes, in Kabul. (AFP)
"Pakistan appears intent to keep hitting targets in Afghanistan, and the Taliban determined to retaliate with operations on Pakistani border posts and potentially with asymmetric tactics — from launching drones to sponsoring militant attacks in wider Pakistan," he said
"There are no off-ramps in sight."
Cross-border trade has ground to a halt and about 115,000 people have been forced to leave their homes due to the conflict, according to the UN Refugee Agency.
The World Food Programme (WFP) said on Sunday that it had started delivering "life-saving food" to more than 20,000 displaced Afghan families and warned that "further instability will push millions into hunger".
AFP, AP, Reuters