Pakistan, Afghanistan agree to ceasefire after border clashes

KARACHI, Pakistan / ISTANBUL

Pakistan and Afghanistan agreed on Wednesday to a 48-hour ceasefire after clashes along their shared border, said official statements from both sides.

A Pakistan Foreign Ministry statement said the ceasefire took effect starting at 6 pm (1300GMT).

The two sides, the Pakistani statement said, will "sincerely" try to resolve this "complicated but solvable" issue through constructive negotiations.

Zabihullah Mujahid, spokesman for the Afghan interim administration, also confirmed that Kabul had reached a ceasefire with Islamabad.

Mujahid added that Kabul has “directed all its forces to respect the ceasefire … unless any aggression takes place.”

This is the second ceasefire since this weekend, after the two sides clashed on Saturday night but stopped after mediation by Qatar and Saudi Arabia.

Hours before the two sides announced the ceasefire, Pakistani security sources said its forces had carried out “precision strikes” inside Afghanistan, in the southern Kandahar province as well as the capital Kabul, “exclusively on Afghan Taliban and Khawarij (Tehreek-e-Taliban militant) hideouts.”

The latest development comes in the wake of fresh border clashes between the sides since Tuesday night.

Early today, Kabul said that 12 Afghan nationals had been killed in clashes with Pakistani forces.

Dozens of soldiers and civilians were killed over the weekend in some of the deadliest clashes between the two sides since 2021, when the Afghan Taliban returned to power in Kabul.

The latest tensions began last week when Kabul accused Islamabad of violating an Afghan ceasefire.