مضمون کا ماخذ : میگا ملینز کا بونس
Pakistan reopens key Afghan trade route for trial run
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan on Friday reopened an important border crossing with Afghanistan after nearly three years in a bid to boost bilateral trade, North Waziristan officials said. The Ghulam Khan border, the third major crossing point with Afghanistan in North Waziristan tribal region, was closed in June 2014 after the military launched a major operation against […]
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan on Friday reopened an important border crossing with Afghanistan after nearly three years in a bid to boost bilateral trade, North Waziristan officials said.
The Ghulam Khan border, the third major crossing point with Afghanistan in North Waziristan tribal region, was closed in June 2014 after the military launched a major operation against the Taliban and foreign militants in the region. The political agent office in Miransha said a convoy of trucks, carrying goods of local traders, departed for Afghanistan in the morning that formally marked resumption of the cross-border trade after a break of around three years.
Political Agent Kamran Afridi said that the border was reopened for a trial run of the new system equipped with bio-metric identification system.
Traders welcomed reopening of the border and hoped that the move would increase cross-border activities in the region and also across the country. The reopening was earlier planned on March 7, but was postponed to ensure more facilities for traders and cross-border movement of the people.
In 2006, Pakistan introduced a passport and visa system for those entering the country via Torkham, the biggest crossing between the two countries. Officials said that the same system would be introduced at Chaman, the second largest point, and other notified crossings. Pakistani officials had informed the Afghan authorities and traders as well as Pakistani traders in North Waziristan about the trial run of the border reopening. Officials said that the Ghulam Khan border point could become the biggest trade route as containers bringing Afghan transit goods from Karachi port would use this crossing instead of Torkham.
Pakistan and Afghanistan have a transit agreement, which was signed in 1960s and revised in 2010, allowing landlocked Afghanistan to import through the Karachi port.
Published in Daily Times, March 10th 2018.
