Amid efforts for peace

As the US and the Taliban engage in a sixth round of direct talks in Qatar

A lot has been happening in the context of the Afghan peace process: the US and the Taliban are engaged in a sixth round of direct talks in Qatar; the Qatari talks have come at the back of a visit to Islamabad by the chief US negotiator, Zalmay Khalilzad, together with Alice Wells, a key White House representative; and a consultative grand assembly, or Loya Jirga, of as many as 3,200 Afghan representatives has been trying to agree to a set of conditions for any peace deal, in what is seen as an attempt by President Ghani to influence the talks in Qatar. Amid all that, 60 to 70 Afghan-based terrorists attacked Pakistani soldiers yesterday undertaking fencing efforts along the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan in Alwara area of North Waziristan tribal district. Three Pakistan Army soldiers were martyred in the attack while scores of terrorists were killed in retaliation.

While the cross-border attack is understood to have come as part of attempts to sabotage the ongoing endeavours for the long-elusive Afghan peace, it also serves as yet another evidence of the Afghan soil being used by terrorists — something that validates Pakistan’s stance on the need for fully fencing the 2,611-kilometre-long, zigzag border to deny liberty of action to terrorists. Pakistani security forces have, in the first phase, fenced about a thousand kilometres of the perilous border, and go ahead with hedging the rest, vowing to complete it by the end of this year. A statement from the ISPR has declared that the fencing efforts “will continue despite all such impediments”.

Kabul’s aversion to Pakistan’s unilateral installation of the robust fence on the largely porous border comes under the guise of humanitarianism, with Afghan officials insisting that any permanent structures on the Durand Line will add to the challenges facing the families divided by the border. But it was the failure of the Afghan authorities to have an effective control on their side of the border that prompted Pakistan to go for securing its side from infiltrators. Those in genuine need and fulfilling formalities, however, continue to be welcomed — albeit under a proper mechanism.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 2^nd, 2019.

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