ISLAMABAD: Five Pakistan soldiers were killed in gunbattles with militants in the country’s northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province that borders Afghanistan, the Pakistani military said on Monday.
The soldiers were killed during an operation against militants in the Khyber district, which also left seven militants dead, according to the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), the military’s media wing. Ten other militants were killed in an operation conducted in the Tank district.
“A large quantity of weapons, ammunition & explosives was also recovered from the killed terrorists, who remained actively involved in numerous terrorist activities against the security forces as well as the innocent civilians,” the ISPR said in a statement.
Sanitization operations were being conducted to eliminate any other threat in these areas, it added.
Monday’s deaths of five Pakistani soldiers were in addition to two other troops, including an army captain, who were killed the previous day in an operation against militants near Peshawar.
Pakistan’s northwestern tribal regions, which border Afghanistan, had long been plagued by the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and other militant groups, until successive military operations since late 2000s drove the militants away.
Islamabad says TTP leaders have taken refuge in neighboring Afghanistan where they run camps to train fighters to launch attacks inside Pakistan. Kabul denies the allegation and says rising violence in Pakistan is a domestic issue for Islamabad.
Relations between Pakistan and Afghanistan have soured in recent months. Islamabad says Kabul is not doing enough to tackle militant groups targeting Pakistan.
On Sunday, Pakistan said it had arrested 11 militants who were involved in a suicide bombing that killed five Chinese engineers, alleging the attack was planned by the TTP in Afghanistan, a charge Kabul has previously denied.
Five soldiers, 17 militants killed in gunbattles in northwest Pakistan — military
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Five soldiers, 17 militants killed in gunbattles in northwest Pakistan — military
- Monday’s deaths of five soldiers were in addition to two other troops, including an army captain, who were killed the previous day in Peshawar
- Islamabad says TTP leaders have taken refuge in neighboring Afghanistan where they run camps to train fighters to launch attacks inside Pakistan
Pakistani students stuck in Afghanistan permitted to go home
- The border between the countries has been shut since Oct. 12
- Worries remain for students about return after the winter break
JALALABAD: After three months, some Pakistani university students who were stuck in Afghanistan due to deadly clashes between the neighboring countries were “permitted to go back home,” Afghan border police said Monday.
“The students from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (northwest Pakistan) who were stuck on this side of the border, only they were permitted to cross and go to their homes,” said Abdullah Farooqi, Afghan border police spokesman.
The border has “not reopened” for other people, he said.
The land border has been shut since October 12, leaving many people with no affordable option of making it home.
“I am happy with the steps the Afghan government has taken to open the road for us, so that my friends and I will be able to return to our homes” during the winter break, Anees Afridi, a Pakistani medical student in eastern Afghanistan’s Nangarhar province, told AFP.
However, worries remain for the hundreds of students about returning to Afghanistan after the break ends.
“If the road is still closed from that side (Pakistan), we will be forced to return to Afghanistan for our studies by air.”
Flights are prohibitively expensive for most, and smuggling routes also come at great risk.
Anees hopes that by the time they return for their studies “the road will be open on both sides through talks between the two governments.”
