Pakistani-fired rockets kill six Afghans
Afghan media reported deaths and injuries as a result of the Pakistani air force's raids on the provinces of Kunar and Khost in southeastern Afghanistan.
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An Afghan boy walks by fences guarded by Pakistani paramilitary personnel at the Pakistan-Afghanistan border crossing in Chaman, Pakistan, on August 23, 2021 (AFP)
Reportedly, at least five children and a woman were killed in an eastern Afghan province when Pakistani military forces fired rockets along the border in a pre-dawn attack on Saturday, an official and a resident said.
The TOLOnews channel Today quoted eyewitnesses as saying that the Pakistani raids targeted the Shilton areas in Kunar and Sbiri in Khost.
The Taliban have stressed that Afghanistan was not harboring Pakistani militants, though there are tensions between Kabul and Islamabad over the latter erecting a fence along their border, known as the Durand line and drawn up in colonial times when the United Kingdom had the region colonized.
"Five children and a woman were killed, and a man was wounded in Pakistani rocket attacks in Shilton district of Kunar," provincial director of information Najibullah Hassan Abdaal told AFP.
Ehsanullah, a resident of Shilton district, said Pakistani military aircraft carried out the assault and confirmed the death toll.
According to another Afghan government official, a similar attack took place in Afghanistan's Kost province.
"Pakistani helicopters bombarded four villages near the Durand line in Khost province," he said on condition of anonymity while asserting that only civilian houses were targeted and there were no casualties.
Hundreds of civilians in Khost took to the streets to protest against Pakistan chanting against and denouncing Islamabad.
Pakistan has been experiencing some political turmoil as of late, with the country's opposition ousting its prime minister, who insists the whole affair was fabricated by the United States due to his anti-US line.
The Pakistani opposition's no-confidence vote against Prime Minister Imran Khan and his government passed on Sunday in the National Assembly with a slight win against MPs who opposed the bid to oust the premier, Pakistani media reported.
The no-confidence vote garnered 174 votes in favor, while the National Assembly has 342 MPs, and the result was announced by PML-N's Ayaz Sadiq, who was chairing the session instead of speaker Asad Qaiser who had resigned minutes before the session started.
With his majority gone, Khan accused the opposition of buying support in the assembly with "open horse-trading... selling of lawmakers like goats and sheep", further accusing them of conspiring with Washington because of his opposition to US foreign policy. He said they financed the opposition's actions on a vote of no confidence.
