PESHAWAR: The Torkham border crossing between Pakistan and Afghanistan has re-opened after a closure of nine days following a shooting between guards on both sides, Khyber Deputy Commissioner Abdul Nasir Khan said.
Thousands of travelers and hundreds of trucks laden with goods were stranded last week by the closure of the Torkham border crossing, at the western end of the fabled Khyber Pass.
Talking to media person Abdul Nasir was of the view that the the Torkham border was opened for pedestrian and vehicular traffic.
A security official in Torkham said talks between the two sides had resolved the issue that sparked the clashes.
Spokespersons for Pakistan’s foreign ministry and authorities in Afghanistan’s eastern province of Nangarhar also confirmed the re-opening.
The road is a key lifeline for landlocked Afghanistan, linking the northwestern Pakistani city of Peshawar to Jalalabad, the main city in Nangarhar, and the route onwards to the capital, Kabul.
“The border closure was causing huge losses to traders and common people of the two neighbouring countries,” said Ziaul Haq Sarhadi, director of the Pakistan-Afghanistan Joint Chamber of Commerce and Industry.
Among dozens of families braving the heat and humidity in a bid to return home was an Afghan refugee, Mohammad Ismail, who had spent a week in a makeshift shelter in Peshawar with his wife and four children, waiting for the border to open.
Dozens families in the queue also complained of very slow processing of documents. Lining the route nearby were hundreds of vehicles carrying perishable fruits, vegetables and other items.
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 totally uncalled for and it 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.
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