Khalid Khan, a neighborhood Pakistani police official, confirmed the border closure and what he described as intermittent exchanges of fireplace at Torkham, situated in Pakistan’s northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province. Pakistan’s army and the Overseas Ministry made no instant feedback.
Mullah Mohammad Siddiq, a Taliban-appointed commissioner at Torkham, mentioned Pakistan has not been abiding by its “commitments, so the crossing level was shut down.” He didn’t elaborate.
Siddiq suggested Afghans to keep away from touring to the border crossing, situated on Afghanistan’s facet within the nation’s jap Nangarhar province, till additional discover.
Cross-border fireplace and shootouts are frequent alongside the Afghan-Pakistan border. All sides has prior to now closed Torkham, and in addition the Chaman border crossing in southwestern Pakistan, for a mess of causes. Each crossings are important for landlocked Afghanistan for commerce and journey.
The Taliban seized energy in Afghanistan in August 2021 as U.S. and NATO troops have been withdrawing from the nation after 20 years of struggle. Like the remainder of the world, Pakistan has to this point not acknowledged Afghanistan’s Taliban authorities. The worldwide group has been cautious of the Taliban’s harsh measures, imposed since their takeover, particularly in limiting the rights of girls and minorities.
Pakistan has witnessed a surge in militant assaults since November, when the Pakistani Taliban ended a monthslong cease-fire with the federal government. The Pakistani Taliban — the outlawed Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan or TTP — is a separate militant group however allied with the Afghan Taliban.
Islamabad has demanded the Afghan Taliban cease providing sanctuary to Pakistani militants and forestall the launching of cross-border assault on Pakistan.
Because the Taliban takeover, the federal government in Islamabad has allowed critically in poor health or injured Afghans to enter Pakistan for medical therapy together with a restricted variety of caretakers.
Related Press author Rahim Faiez in Islamabad contributed to this story.
