ISLAMABAD: Afghan Ambassador to Pakistan Omar Zakhilwal has said the closure of the Pak-Afghan border is illegal under the Afghanistan-Pakistan Trade and Transit Agreement (APTTA).
The security arrangements along Torkharm, Spin Boldak, Chaman, and other crossing points are heavily regulated.
He said he had also written a letter to the Pakistan Army requesting the reopening these border crossings. On twitter, the Afghan Ambassador stated the closures of these crossing points, which are heavily regulated with full checking arrangements on both sides, serve no purpose other than to inflict hardship on ordinary people and hurt trade and transit. In in his letter to the military leadership, he expressed his strong hoped that these crossing points would reopen without causing any further unnecessary hardship.
“I conveyed the same to Sartaj Aziz, Adviser to the prime minister on foreign affairs.” Pakistan shut the Pak-Afghan border last week ‘indefinitely’ due to security reasons after the recent wave of terror in which more than 100 people were martyred across the country. ISPR DG Major General Asif Ghafoor in a tweet said, “Pakistan-Afghanistan border is closed with immediate effects till further orders due to security reasons.”
The border was closed right after a suicide attack at the shrine of Sufi Saint Hazrat Lal Shahbaz Qalandar in Sehwan Sharif, Sindh – the worst attack in the country since 2014.
