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ISLAMABAD: Pakistan and Afghanistan traded sharp warnings on Friday after Kabul accused Islamabad of violating its airspace and bombing a border town and the Pakistani military vowing to do “whatever is necessary” to defend its territorial integrity.

Pakistan has long accused Afghanistan of harboring militant groups, particularly the Pakistani Taliban, which have mounted attacks against Pakistani security forces and law enforcement, though the Afghan administration denies the allegation.

The military spokesman, Lt. Gen. Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry, held a long news conference in the northwestern Pakistani city of Peshawar, citing threat of cross-border militancy only days after the killing of at least a dozen Pakistani soldiers, including three officers, in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) province that borders Afghanistan.

His media interaction came after reports of airstrikes in the Afghan capital of Kabul that purportedly sought to target Noor Wali Mehsud, the Pakistani Taliban chief.

“We just ask them [the Afghan authorities] for an extremely fair, just thing that, ‘do not let your soil become a haven for non-state actors and terrorist groups,’” Chaudhry said at a media briefing.

“For the safety of life and property of people of Pakistan, for the territorial integrity of Pakistan, we are doing and we will continue to do whatever is necessary.”

He said the Pakistani security forces have been conducting over 40 operations against militants on a daily basis, which have resulted in the killing of more than 900 militants so far this year. More than 300 Pakistani security personnel have also died in these operations, he added.

Chaudhry lamented a lack of implementation of all 14 points of the National Action Plan, a comprehensive strategy devised in 2014 to eradicate militant violence, other than the one stressing kinetic operations against militants.

“Governance and public welfare were deliberately weakened and attempts were made to build a misleading narrative,” the spokesman said, adding the people in KP, which borders Afghanistan, were still losing their lives to militancy.

Meanwhile, the Afghan defense ministry said Pakistani forces had “targeted a civilian market in the Margha area of Paktika province” near the international border and also “violated the airspace over the capital, Kabul.”

The ministry called the strikes “unprecedented, violent, and reprehensible,” warning that “regardless of how critical the situation becomes, the consequences will fall with the Pakistani army.”

Pakistan has struggled to contain a surge in militancy in KP since a fragile truce between the government and the Pakistani Taliban, or the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), broke down in Nov. 2022.

The TTP, which is a separate group but is viewed by Pakistani officials as an ally of the Afghan Taliban, has been behind some of the deadliest attacks in Pakistan since late 2000s.

Islamabad launched multiple military operations over the last two decades to push away TTP fighters and other militants, but officials say they have managed to regroup in the rugged, mountainous northwest during their monthslong truce with the government.