The Afghan government rejected claims on Saturday that it was behind Friday's attack on a Peshawar Air Base after the Pakistan government accused Afghanistan of having carried out the attack.

Twenty nine people, including 16 worshipers at a mosque and 13 airmen and soldiers died in the attack.

In a statement issued by the Presidential Palace on Saturday, President Ashraf Ghani's office called the accusations baseless and strongly rejected the claims.

The statement said that Afghanistan reiterates its position that it has not and will never allow the country to be used as a launch pad to attack another country.

It stated that Afghanistan is also a victim of terrorism and it feels the pain of the attack. Government also shared its condolences with the victims of the attack.

"The Islamic Republic of Afghanistan believes that terrorism is the enemy of all humans and that there are no good or bad terrorists. So because of this the regional governments, specially Afghanistan and Pakistan, must find common ground to be honest with each other in eliminating this phenomenon."

It said that the military operation by Pakistan in Waziristan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa has impacted Afghanistan and Pakistan and that the government of Afghanistan has conducted massive efforts to fight terrorism in recent years. Once again we are calling on Pakistan to jointly work with Afghanistan in fighting against all terrorist groups honestly so that peace and stability can come to Afghanistan, Pakistan and the region.

Government's remarks come just hours after Pakistani military spokesman, General Asim Saleem Bajwa, said on Friday that security forces had concluded that the gunmen who killed 29 people in the northwestern city of Peshawar, including 16 worshipers at a mosque, "came from Afghanistan".

The attack on a Pakistani military base triggered an hours-long firefight and Pakistani forces said they killed 13 of the attackers, though it was unclear how many were involved in the assault.

According to Bajwa: ""The conclusion we draw from the (intercepted) conversations is that the attackers came from Afghanistan. This operation was planned in Afghanistan, controlled and executed from Afghanistan."

"I would hope that the state (Afghanistan) will absolutely not take part in such actions and the way we and Afghans are brothers, I absolutely would not expect this and no Pakistani can even think that our Afghan brothers, the Afghan government or the state could encourage this sort of thing," he said.

LINK: https://www.ansarpress.com/english/4166

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