Trade resumes as Pakistan, Afghanistan reopen Torkham border

“More than a week after a gunfight between border guards forced its closure, the Torkham border crossing between Afghanistan and Pakistan reopened to pedestrians and cars early on Friday.”

Trade resumes as Torkham border reopen: “After Pakistan accused Afghanistan of constructing a new structure on its soil and the security forces of both nations exchanged gunfire, they closed the border crossing.”

According to Irshad Khan Mohmamd, the assistant commissioner of the Khyber district, “the clearance of trucks is in progress and Afghan citizens are entering Afghanistan after clearance and passing immigration processes.”

The border crossing between the two countries, which share a porous 2,600-kilometer (1,600-mile) border that runs across rocky mountains and valleys, is the busiest for trade and people.

Traders on both sides of the border complained that they lost tonnes of perishable items due to the border shutdown.

“Unprovoked firing by Afghan border security forces invariably emboldens the terrorist elements,” the Pakistani foreign ministry stated on Monday.

According to spokeswoman Mumtaz Zahra Baloch, “Pakistan has continued to exercise restraint and prioritise dialogue in the face of persistent, unwarranted provocations by Afghan troops deployed along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border.”

“She accused Afghan troops of resorting to indiscriminate firing on the 6th of September, targeting Pakistan military posts, damaging the infrastructure at the Torkham Border Terminal, and putting the lives of both Pakistani and Afghan civilians at risk when they were prevented from erecting unlawful structures.”

Such unjustified and indiscriminate firing on Pakistani border stations, she claimed, could never be justified.

Further, 18 crossing locations connect the two landlocked nations of Pakistan and Afghanistan. The busiest of these are the Torkham and Chaman, which link the Balochistan province of Pakistan in the southwest with the Kandahar province of Afghanistan in the south.

Since the Taliban retook power in Afghanistan in 2021, there has been an increase in terrorist strikes in Pakistan.