KABUL: Afghanistan’s defence ministry on Thursday praised Pakistan’s military offensive against the Taliban and pledged to cooperate on its side of the border, AFP reports.

Kabul has long urged Islamabad to get tougher against militants holed up in its semi-autonomous tribal areas, where it claims al Qaeda and Taliban fighters have carved out bases for carrying out attacks in Afghanistan.

‘Afghanistan supports operations launched by the army of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan against terrorists,’ the ministry said in a statement.

‘The Afghan defence ministry is carefully inspecting these operations and will try to fully cooperate... with Pakistani military authorities, to coordinate its action in the region,’ it said.

Afghan, Pakistani and foreign commanders based in Afghanistan sit on a commission that meets regularly to discuss efforts against extremists.

The Afghan defence ministry said there was an ‘urgent need for war against terrorism and that requires sincere and honest regional military action and international support.’

Pakistan’s operations bode well for efforts to fight ‘terrorists’ and for the expansion of regional military cooperation, it said.

Mutual recriminations about the rising Islamist threat in the region soured relations between the neighbours under former Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf, a military general who took power in a coup.

But tensions have eased with the election of Pakistan’s civilian government last year headed by President Asif Ali Zardari.