ISLAMABAD: Pakistan has boosted security and arrested dozens of suspects as it fears rising wave of militant attacks following its air strikes in Afghanistan, Pakistan’s Junior Interior Minister said on Wednesday. “Our forces are on high-alert to combat any attacks,” the minister, Talal Chaudhry, told Reuters. “You know the militants always react whenever we go after their hideouts in Afghanistan.” Pakistan carried out air strikes on targets in Afghanistan over the weekend on what it said were militant targets responsible for a spate of recent suicide bombings on Pakistani soil.
Islamabad blames Kabul for allowing the fighters to use Afghanistan as a safe haven. Kabul denies the charges, saying the militancy is Pakistan’s internal problem.
Pakistani and Afghan forces exchanged fire along their border on Tuesday, with each side accusing the other of initiating the clash.
There have also been a number of militant attacks, including the ambush of a police vehicle in Kohat city in Pakistan’s northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province in which five officers and two civilians were killed and a suicide bombing at a checkpoint that killed two policemen.
Chaudhry said the retaliatory attacks by militants proved Islamabad’s case that they had linkages in Afghanistan, adding that the forces had averted several attacks in recent weeks and arrested a number of suspects, including Afghans.
