Living with border tension: Durand Line’s fencing is no easy task

Tension has blown over into armed clashes at several points along the Pakistan-Afghan border


Shamim Shahid November 10, 2014

PESHAWAR: Fencing the Durand Line is virtually impossible given the kind of opposition it evokes from people across Afghanistan, many of whom view it as an aberration dividing the Pakhtuns.

Since its demarcation in 1893, several unsuccessful attempts have been made to mark out the Durand Line. Each time, however, the plan has floundered after meeting fierce opposition from the Afghan people and successive governments as well.



Due to lingering divisions on the Durand Line, there are routine clashes involving the security personnel of both Pakistan and Afghanistan from time to time. Such divisions often lead to a loss of precious lives.

Former military ruler General Pervez Musharraf once made a valiant attempt to lay out trenches and fence the Pak-Afghan border in a bid to block cross border incursions on both sides. At the time Musharraf had garnered political as well as financial support of the US-led coalition in the “war on terror.”

His plan met with limited success on both sides of the Durand Line at Chaman border, connecting Balochistan with Kandahar province of Afghanistan. Yet, overall, his efforts were foiled by angry Afghans at Torkham crossing of Khyber Agency and several points in both Mohmand and Bajaur tribal agencies.

The iron gate installed by Pakistan on the main entry point at Torkham has disappeared since then. And now there is no gate or barricade dividing the two countries.

Routine travelling and transportation between Pakistan and Afghanistan through Torkham is controlled by a “chain.” For the last several years, the Torkham entry point has been declared among the busiest border crossing points in the world. Between 10,000 and 15,000 people make the crossing every day whereas the number of vehicles, loaded with items from both sides are registered from 2,000 to 2,500 on a daily basis, according to official estimates.

The Durand Line still represents the “porous border” between Pakistan and Afghanistan. People residing on both sides of the Durand Line right from the narrow strip of Wakhan in Chitral till Taftan in Balochistan share common ancestry and heritage, and have blood ties with each other.

Such people are not only allowed free movement but even also permitted to keep the nationalities of both Pakistan and Afghanistan.

Pakistan has made earnest efforts to demarcate the remaining portion of Durand Line after 1947 and tried to convince successive Afghan rulers to recognise it as the international border.

Despite accepting the 1919, 1921, and 1930 treaties regarding rectification of the Indo-Afghan frontier, ie, Durand Line, Afghan leaders do not accept the Durand Line on the claim that Amir Abdul Rahman Khan had signed the English version of the agreement, a language he could not read or understand.

Since the return of the monarchy in 1933 till today almost all Afghan rulers and government leaders are opposed to this demarcation. Even Afghan Mujahideen leaders like Sibghatullah Mujaddadi, Prof Burhanuddin Rabbani and ex-president Hamid Karzai have refused to recognise the Durand Line as a permanent border between the two countries.

A similar response came from Mullah Mohammad Rabbani, chief of Afghanistan’s supreme council during the rule of the Taliban from September 1996 till his death in 2000.

So far, the newly installed Afghan president, Dr Ashraf Ghani has not made any formal statement regarding the controversy over the border with Pakistan but his stance on the actual Durand Line is unlikely to be different from his predecessors.

Pakistan believes and, in according to the international convention as under uti possidetis juris (as you possess under law), it should not require a formal agreement. Courts in several countries around the world and according to the Vienna Convention have universally upheld via uti possidetis juris that binding bilateral agreements are “passed down” to successor states. Thus, a unilateral declaration by one party has no effect; boundary changes must be made bilaterally.

The recent legal debate on the issue of the Durand Line has focused on the original nature of the contract between Afghanistan and British India. Some scholars have suggested that the Durand Line was never intended to be a boundary demarcating sovereignty, but rather a line of control beyond which either side agreed not to interfere unless there was an expedient need to do so.

Though Britain clearly supports and endorses Pakistan claim on the issue of the Durand Line, the United States has a different point of view. A spokesperson for the US State Department’s Office of the Geographer and Global Issues stated, “Because the Durand Line divides the Pashtun and Baloch people, it continues to be a source of tension between the governments of Pakistan and Afghanistan.”

Amid the controversy over the Durand Line, tension and mistrust between Pakistan and Afghanistan has lingered for decades and has caused armed clashes at several points. Such clashes have now become routine in Mohmand, Bajaur, Khyber agencies and certain pockets of Kurram Agency.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 10th, 2014.

COMMENTS (2)

Abid Riaz | 9 years ago | Reply

@Adeel By that you mean, let Punjab take over the rest of Pashtunistan too? Wake up, you are losing the part you already have.

Adeel | 9 years ago | Reply

I kinda endorse US departments' stance. Pashtun dominated areas in Afghanistan can be merged with Pakistan

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