Pakistan-Afghanistan border to be fenced, decision taken
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LANDI KOTAL: Pakistan has taken the key decisions about the Pakistan-Afghistan borer management in order to eliminate the cross border terrorism.
The federal government has decided in principal to fence the country’s border with Afghanistan to stop suspected Afghan people from entering Pakistani territory, said a security official here on Monday.
The official said that the border fencing would begin in ‘a couple of months’ in line with a recent decision made in a high-level meeting.
In April last year, too, a bid to fence some portions of the border was made. It however caused a dalmatic row drawing Afghanistan’s strong reaction and leading to the closure of Torkham border for five days.
In the past, such bids had attracted scathing criticism of the country’s ‘nationalist’ political parties.
The security official however insisted the border fencing was part of the newly-implemented border management plan, which had yielded ‘positive and effective’ results.
“Not a single suspected militant or suicide bomber has crossed Torkham border into Pakistan since June last year when the border management policy was executed,” he said.
The official said the complete data of the visitors to Pakistan via Torkham border was maintained under the new policy and that the data was later crosschecked if and when a terrorist incident took place in the country.
He claimed no trace of any saboteur’s entry to the country from Afghanistan had been found since June last year declaring the new border management mechanism a success.
‘We understand that the closure of border was not an ideal decision as both the neighbouring countries have mutual interests and heavily depend on each other in the field of trade and necessary items of daily use,” he said.
The official said though militancy couldn’t be completely eliminated with such measures, they would help drastically minimise terrorist incidents in the country.