Uzbekistan announced that it had forced 46 Afghan helicopters and warplanes to land inside its territory after breaching the border, during the Taliban's advance towards the capital, Kabul, and its control over it.
The Public Prosecutor of Uzbekistan said on Monday that 22 warplanes and 24 Afghan military helicopters crossed the border on Saturday and Sunday, carrying 585 soldiers, and were forced to land at Termez International Airport in the south.
He added that these planes illegally crossed the airspace of Uzbekistan.
For its part, the Uzbek Defense Ministry said on Monday that its air defenses shot down an Afghan military plane in the Surkusundario district (the southernmost Uzbekistan), bordering Afghanistan, after illegally crossing the border.
A Russian agency quoted the Ministry of Defense in Uzbekistan that the pilot got out of the plane, but was injured, while activists broadcast pictures on social networking sites showing what is believed to be an Afghan pilot during his rescue after his plane was shot down inside Uzbek territory.
Uzbekistan said last Sunday that it had detained 84 Afghan soldiers who crossed the border and sought medical help, and it was reported that it had returned hundreds of soldiers who tried to cross a bridge at the border between the two countries.
According to media reports, the Afghan anti-Taliban commander Abdul Rashid Dostum was among the soldiers who managed to flee towards Uzbekistan after the movement took control of the city of Mazar-i-Sharif (the capital of Balkh province in northern Afghanistan).