Pakistan promised on Sunday a "strong response" to the retaliatory operation carried out by Afghanistan against its forces overnight on their shared border, which reportedly cost the lives of "58 Pakistani soldiers," according to Kabul.

On Saturday evening, the Taliban Defense Ministry announced that it had "successfully" carried out an armed operation against Pakistani security forces "in response to repeated violations and airstrikes on Afghan territory by the Pakistani army."

In total, "58 Pakistani soldiers were killed during this operation and 9 Taliban lost their lives," Taliban government spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said at a press conference on Sunday.

Islamabad has not confirmed this number. "There will be no compromise on Pakistan's defense, and every provocation will be met with a strong and effective response," Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif warned in a statement on Sunday, accusing Kabul of harboring "terrorist elements."

For his part, Zabihullah Mujahid indicated on Sunday that Pakistan had attacked this morning and said he was "ready to respond firmly."

An AFP journalist in Afghanistan's Khost province confirmed heavy gunfire early Sunday morning from Pakistan at the border.

Both countries claim to have captured enemy security posts.

Islamabad, which has not confirmed that it was behind the explosions in the Afghan capital and in the southeast of the country on Thursday, said on Saturday evening that it was under attack on its border.

He claimed to have responded to attacks carried out from the Afghan provinces of Kunar, Nangarhar, Paktia, Khost and Helmand, all along the Durand Line, which divides the two countries.

While Iran and Saudi Arabia called on the two countries to "de-escalate," Kabul finally announced to AFP the end of its operation around midnight local time.

In the early hours of the morning, two key crossing points between Pakistan and Afghanistan, Torkham and Spin Boldak, through which thousands of Afghans expelled in recent months by Islamabad have been passing, were closed, senior Afghan and Pakistani officials told AFP.

- Night attack -

Since the Afghan Taliban returned to power in the summer of 2021, relations between the two neighbors have continued to deteriorate, with Islamabad accusing its neighbor of "harboring" the Pakistani Taliban (TTP).

This movement, formed in combat in Afghanistan and which claims to share the same ideology as the Afghan Taliban, is accused by Islamabad of having killed hundreds of its soldiers since 2021.

On Saturday, the TTP claimed responsibility for deadly attacks in northwest Pakistan bordering Afghanistan that left 23 people dead, mostly Pakistani soldiers.

"Islamabad has repeatedly warned Kabul of the increasing number of deadly attacks on its soldiers from Afghan soil, assuring that it would eventually strike the militants' hideouts, and that is what happened," Maleeha Lhodi, a former senior Pakistani diplomat, told AFP.

The Taliban government accused Islamabad of having "violated Kabul's territorial sovereignty" on Thursday, when two explosions rocked the capital and a third in the southeast of the country, which experts believe were probably aimed at TTP targets.

"These border clashes have plunged relations between the two neighbors to their lowest level in history, but neither country can afford a diplomatic breakdown," said Ms. Lhodi.

For his part, Wahid Faqiri, an expert in international relations, believes that "the unprecedented warming of relations between the Taliban and India" has "provoked the anger of Pakistan and pushed Islamabad to aggression."

New Delhi welcomed Taliban Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi on Friday for the first time since 2021 and announced that the Indian diplomatic mission in Kabul would become a full-fledged embassy again.

"Today, the conflict between Afghanistan and Pakistan is rapidly escalating, and the Taliban are now trying to exploit the current patriotic sentiment to their advantage against Pakistan," Faqiri continued.

A UN Security Council report released earlier this year estimated that the TTP "has arguably been the foreign extremist group in Afghanistan that has benefited most" from the return of the Afghan Taliban, "who have welcomed and actively supported" the movement.

But Kabul firmly denies this and refers the accusation to Islamabad, assuring that Pakistan supports "terrorist" groups, notably the regional branch of the Islamic State group (IS).

On Thursday, Pakistani Defense Minister Khawaja Muhammad Asif told parliament that multiple attempts to convince the Afghan Taliban to stop supporting the TTP had failed.