At least six Pakistani nationals were killed and 17 others injured on Sunday when Afghan border troops resorted to “unprovoked and indiscriminate fire” across the border into Balochistan’s Chaman district, the army said.
According to the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), the media wing of the military, heavy weapons including artillery and mortars were used in the firing by Afghan forces.
“The Afghan Border Forces opened unprovoked and indiscriminate fire of heavy weapons including artillery and mortar onto the civilian population,” it said in a statement.
Six Pakistani civilians were killed and 17 others injured in the firing, it said.
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The injured have been shifted to a local hospital, and the police have cordoned off the area, according to Samaa TV. Pakistan’s border forces have responded through retaliatory firing, the statement said.
The Pakistan government has approached Afghan authorities in Kabul to highlight the severity of the situation and demanded strict action to avoid a recurrence of this incident in the future, it added.
It was not immediately clear the reason for the firing.
The extent of losses on the Afghan side were also not known.
Sunday’s standoff at the border comes barely 24 hours after authorities in Pakistan said that its counterterrorism forces had intercepted four Islamic State Khorasan Province (IS-K) militants close to the Afghan border and killed them.
Last month, eight people, including two children and three paramilitary soldiers, were injured in Kurram district of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province when some Afghans from across the border opened fire at them over a dispute over the construction of a road.
Pakistan and Afghanistan share a 2,600-km volatile border.