Tilak Devasher, former member of India’s National Security Advisory Board and an expert on the Afghanistan–Pakistan theatre, warns that relations between Kabul and Islamabad are likely to deteriorate further after Pakistan launched drone and air strikes on Kabul targeting the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) leadership.

Speaking hours after the strikes — which came days after a deadly TTP ambush inside Pakistan and while Taliban foreign minister Amir Khan Muttaqi was on his first official visit to New Delhi — Devasher described the operation as “a dramatic escalation” whose timing was deliberate.

He said Islamabad appeared rattled by Muttaqi’s warm reception in India and New Delhi’s decision to upgrade its technical mission in Kabul to an embassy. “They have been strutting about sayin

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