New Delhi: India on Monday (June 29) condemned Pakistan’s airstrikes in Afghanistan over the weekend as a “reckless” and “blatant act of aggression” that threatens regional peace, and the UN’s assistance mission in Kabul has confirmed that the attacks killed at least 28 civilians while injuring 49 others.In a statement the external affairs ministry said that India strongly condemns the Pakistani airstrikes conducted in the intervening night of Sunday and Monday, which Islamabad said targeted terrorist hideouts.“This blatant act of aggression by Pakistan is an assault on Afghanistan’s sovereignty and a direct threat to regional peace and stability,” ministry spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said.He said the incident “reflects Pakistan’s persistent pattern of reckless behaviour and its futile attempt to externalise internal failures through desperate acts of violence beyond its borders”, adding to condole the deaths from the strikes and underlining India’s “unwavering support for Afghanistan’s sovereignty and territorial integrity”.Afghanistan said on Monday that the Pakistani airstrikes in its Paktia, Paktika and Kunar provinces hit houses and killed 36 civilians in addition to injuring 163 others.During one of the airstrikes, in Paktia, a Pakistani aircraft after killing an elderly man as well as a child by bombing their home attacked the area again when others reached the scene to rescue the injured, wounding 158 others and raising the death toll to 30, said deputy Taliban spokesperson Hamdullah Fitrat.Another airstrike, in Paktika, killed six civilians, most of them women and children, while a third attack in Kunar caused property damage but no fatalities, added Fitrat.UNAMA, the UN’s assistance mission in Afghanistan, said it could verify 28 fatalities, including 22 in the Paktia airstrike and six in the Paktika attack, adding that it corroborated two child injuries in Kunar. “These figures are preliminary and may increase as hospitals continue to treat the injured,” it noted.It reiterated its “call for respect for the international humanitarian law principles of precaution, distinction and proportionality to protect civilians from harm”.Kabul also summoned the charge d’affaires of the Pakistani embassy and presented him with its “strong and resolute protest” of the Pakistani “violation of Afghanistan’s airspace” and “bombing of civilian homes”.Pakistan’s military regime attributes security incidents to Afghanistan without evidence and instead tries to “conceal its own security and political failures by imposing baseless accusations on Afghanistan” in addition to carrying out attacks across the border, the Afghan foreign ministry said.“This kind of behavior,” it continued, “is not only not a path to solving the existing problems, but it also causes serious damage to the atmosphere of trust between the two countries, neighbourly relations, and the security and stability of the region.”However Pakistan said its armed forces carried out precise attacks targeting terror infrastructure and killing 29 terrorists across the border in the aftermath of terrorist attacks including one in which three Pakistan Rangers personnel were killed in Karachi on Saturday. The Jamaat-ul-Ahrar faction of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) has claimed responsibility for the latter.After the Karachi attack, Pakistani forces conducted an operation in the country’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province and killed one terrorist commander in addition to three others belonging to the Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, said Attaullah Tarar, the information and broadcasting minister in Islamabad. He also repeated Pakistan’s claim that the splinter group is an “Indian proxy”, which New Delhi had denied on Sunday.Pakistan also conducted the airstrikes in Paktia, Paktika and Kunar, which killed 29 terrorists in addition to destroying large amounts of weapons and ammunition, Tarar said. “Pakistan has always strived for maintaining peace and stability in the region, but at the same time shall not compromise on the safety and security of our citizens, which remains our top priority.”Islamabad too summoned the charge d’affaires of the Afghan embassy and issued him a demarche – with the Pakistani envoy in Kabul doing the same to the foreign ministry there – alleging that Afghan nationals had participated in the Karachi attack, “proving yet again that Afghan soil and nationals continue to be used to orchestrate terrorist attacks inside Pakistan”.Militant attacks targeting Pakistan’s police and security forces have surged in recent years, with the Pakistani authorities blaming the TTP and allied militant groups for most of the violence.Sunday’s cross-border strikes and ground operation came less than three weeks after Pakistan’s military launched airstrikes on what it said were militant hideouts in Afghanistan. They ended about a month of relative calm following what Islamabad had described as an “open war” between the neighbouring countries, despite international efforts to broker a lasting peace.The escalation follows months of military action. Hundreds of people have been killed in cross-border fighting since February, when Afghanistan launched retaliatory strikes after Pakistan carried out airstrikes inside Afghan territory.Multiple rounds of talks have failed to secure a lasting ceasefire. China hosted the two sides in April and Beijing later said Pakistan and Afghanistan had agreed not to escalate their conflict and to explore a solution.With inputs from AP.