Torkham border crossing remains closed for Afghan elections

Security forces placed on high alert

PESHAWAR: The Torkham border crossing remained closed on Saturday for a second consecutive day on account of parliamentary elections in Afghanistan.

Security forces manning the area have been placed on high alert and supply for Afghan transit and NATO forces stand temporarily suspended. The crossing will remain closed for one more day.



Trade  and business activities are worst affected and scores of vehicles are parked around the border with cars queuing at thoroughfares.

Afghans are bracing for more deadly violence in the long-delayed legislative election that the Taliban has vowed to attack.

Polling centres opened at 7am across the war-torn country, with some 54,000 security forces deployed to protect them.

But there are concerns the killing of a powerful police chief in southern Afghanistan on Thursday will scare off many voters.

Polling has been delayed in Kandahar province until October 27 after a Taliban-claimed attack on a US-Afghan security meeting that killed three people, including General Abdul Raziq.

General Scott Miller, the top US and NATO commander in Afghanistan, escaped injury in the shooting, but 13 others were wounded.

The Independent Election Commission (IEC) on Friday urged voters to turn out to cast their ballots–but “vote only once”–and called on others not to interfere in the process.



Almost nine million people have registered to vote in the parliamentary election, which is more than three years late and only the third since the fall of the Taliban in 2001.

But the threat of militant attacks and expectations for massive fraud are expected to deter many voters from showing up at the more than 5,000 polling centres.

Shambolic preparations for the ballot have been made worse by a wave of poll-related violence that has left hundreds dead or wounded.
At least 10 candidates out of more than 2,500 contesting the lower-house election have been killed so far.

The most recent victim was Abdul Jabar Qahraman, who was blown up Wednesday by a bomb placed under his sofa in the southern province of Helmand.