Spera, Khost – Much like every other morning last week, 25-year-old Peer Jannat religiously woke up at 2.30am on April 16 to prepare for Sehri (Suhoor) – a pre-dawn meal Muslims consume ahead of their daily fasts in the holy month of Ramadan.
“Just as we were sitting down, we heard sounds of drones followed by sounds of jets … seconds later we heard an explosion. They [Pakistan military] were bombing us,” Jannat, a resident of Afghan-Dubai [the name is a reference to the many families that often send members to the Gulf nation for work] in Khost, an Afghan province that lies along the border with Pakistan, told Al Jazeera.
At least 47 people died, including 20 children, in air raids carried out in three villages of the Spera district of Khost, as well as in Chogam village in the Sheltan district of Kunar, according to locals and Taliban officials. Both provinces lie on the 2,700-km- (1677-mile-) border with Pakistan.
“In Khost, 12 girls and three boys were killed; in Kunar, three girls and two boys were killed,” said Mohamed Ag Ayoya, an Afghan UNICEF representative, adding that the children were “killed in their homes as they slept”.
The Taliban blamed Pakistan for the deadly raids but the Pakistani government has maintained silence. Its embassy in the Afghan capital, Kabul, denied Islamabad was behind the border attacks.
“In our area, they targeted two places, and bombarded three more places in the next village. Dozens of people were killed, many of them women and children … in some families only a child survived,” Jannat said, frustration evident in his voice.
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