PESHAWAR: Pakistan said on Sunday 23 of its soldiers were killed and 29 wounded in overnight cross-border clashes with Afghan Taliban fighters and other militants in the fiercest fighting between the two neighbors since the Taliban seized power in Kabul in 2021. The confrontation marks an unprecedented escalation of hostilities along the porous 2,611-kilometer (1,622-mile) frontier, known as the Durand Line, and threatens to unravel already fragile relations between Islamabad and Kabul.

Escalation comes after Pakistani airstrike in Kabul, with Taliban launching reprisals against military posts

Taliban officials say overnight cross-border attacks resulted in killing of 58 Pakistani soldiers