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PESHAWAR: The Torkham border crossing between Pakistan and Afghanistan reopened on Friday after a nine-day closure due to clashes between border forces.
Pakistan shut the key northwestern border with its neighbour on September 6 after guards from both countries exchanged fire. It accused Taliban authorities of building “unlawful structures” in the vicinity.
Thousands of travellers and hundreds of trucks laden with goods were stranded last week by the closure of the Torkham border crossing.
Khyber Deputy Commissioner Nasir Khan said the crossing reopened Friday morning. Afghanistan’s commissioner in Torkham, Ismatullah Yaqoob, said stranded trucks and pedestrians have started passing through the border.
Pakistan and Afghanistan Joint Chamber of Commerce representative welcomed the move. “The reopening has ended the nine-day-long trouble faced by traders on both sides of the border,” said Ziaul Haq Sarhadi. Traders have faced heavy losses in perishable items, he said.
Pakistan’s envoy to Afghanistan Ubaidur Rehman Nizamani met the Taliban administration’s Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi in Kabul a day earlier. They discussed the recent surge in terror incidents and the closure of Torkham.
Border security guards of both countries resorted to heavy firing at each other’s positions on September 6 when Afghan authorities started building a security post close to Pakistan’s side of the border.
An FC personnel and a Customs clearing agent on the Pakistan side of the border were injured during the two-hour-long exchange of fire in which both sides used light and heavy weapons.
Pakistani officials had insisted that the establishment of a new security post near the border crossing was also a violation of the understanding reached between the two countries about any such development which was to be mutually discussed and agreed.
The Afghan foreign office in one of its statements had insisted that they were only renovating an old post on their own territory and which was of no harm to the Pakistani side.
The week-long closure of the border caused trading and transport community on both sides of the border huge financial losses while it also rendered hundreds of poor labourers and daily-wage earners jobless.
