Pakistan warns Taliban regime of unwavering, befitting response

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan on Sunday warned the “Taliban regime” that “any further provocations would be met with an unwavering and befitting response” after a swift and effective retaliatory action by the armed forces eliminated more than 200 Afghan Taliban and the associated terrorists.

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The Ministry of Foreign Affairs issued the statement as the ISPR — military’s media wing — earlier in the day said “Pakistan will continue to exercise its right to defend its people by persistent neutralization of terror targets,” if it fails to act against the terrorists organisations operating from Afghanistan.

Read more: ISPR to Afghan Taliban: Pakistan to continue neutralizing terror targets

“Pakistan is deeply concerned at the unwarranted aggression by the Afghan Taliban, Fitna al-Khawarij and Fitna al-Hindustan along the Pak-Afghan border,” read a statement.

The Foreign Office added, “Such unprovoked actions aimed at destabilising the Pak-Afghan border belie the overall spirit of peaceful neighbourhood and cooperative relations between the two brotherly countries.”

Separately, Defence Minister Khawaja Asif on Sunday said the situation with Afghanistan have reached a point where the Afghan nationals living in Pakistan would now have to return to their country.

RIGHT TO SELF-DEFENCE

On the other hand, the Foreign Office mentioned that “Pakistan, exercising its right of self-defence, not only effectively repulsed the assaults all along the border, but also inflicted heavy losses on the Taliban and affiliated Khawarij, in terms of men, material and infrastructure.

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“These infrastructures were used to plan and facilitate terrorist attacks against Pakistan,” it added.

REJECTED

At the same time, Pakistan also rejected the “assertions and insinuations by the Interim Afghan Foreign Minister [Amir Khan Muttaqi] in India to divert attention from the presence of terrorist elements in Afghanistan.

“By making these baseless assertions, the Taliban regime cannot absolve itself of its responsibilities towards regional peace and stability.”

“Continued presence of terrorist elements on Afghan soil and the freedom of activities enjoyed by them in Afghanistan are well documented in UN Monitoring Team reports.”