The Ministry of Foreign Affairs summoned Afghan chargé d'affaires on Tuesday to lodge a "strong protest" over a cross-border attack that martyred two Pakistani soldiers.

Captain Junaid Hafeez and Sepoy Raham were martyred while four soldiers were injured in a suspected militant attack on a checkpost near the Pak-Afghan border in Bajaur Agency yesterday.

There has been an increase in the number of attacks across the Pak-Afghan border where the Pakistani forces are "engaged in strengthening border management", which "confirms the presence of a large number of terrorists in the increasingly ungoverned spaces in Afghanistan", the foreign ministry's statement said.

The foreign ministry urged the Afghan government to "take action" against militant elements that have found safe havens in Afghanistan and were using the territory to "target" Pakistan's armed forces. The statement cited the murder of a Pakistan consulate employee in Jalalabad earlier this month and said that the terrorist groups on Afghan soil pose a serious threat to "peace and stability in Afghanistan and the region".

The ministry also insisted that the Afghan government strengthen border management in order to prevent cross-border attacks on Pakistan forces.