Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) Director General (DG) Lt Gen Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry has said that Afghan forces open fire at Pakistani checkposts across the border to facilitate the infiltration of terrorists into the country.
He made the comments during a briefing with journalists on November 25, a video of which was released by the ISPR on Friday evening.
“Borders are always mutually guarded. Both countries [guard] them. Now, on the other side is such a country whose posts first engage your posts through fire, and an exchange begins. And then they have them (terrorists) pass through the gaps in between,” Lt Gen Chaudhry said.
The DG ISPR said one would barely find any “administration” on the borders in terrorism-prone areas, except in “hardly five to 10 per cent” of the areas.
“Go to Tirah, Khyber; you will not find any governance. Neither will you find any courts, nor any departments that deal with law enforcement and writ of the government.”
The ISPR chief also pointed out that villages and populations were “divided” across the Pak-Afghan border.
“There are 29 tribes here that are divided, whose population is here (Pakistan) and there (Afghanistan) as well. Right on the border. How will you control the movement there?” he asked.
He noted that many questioned how terrorists could infiltrate the Pak-Afghan border, how smuggling was carried out, and how non-custom paid vehicles were able to pass through if the army and the Frontier Corps were stationed at the border.
The military spokesperson then showed images of border fences. He highlighted that military posts were set up at a distance of about 15-25 kilometres from the border.
Noting suggestions for hermetically sealing the border, the DG ISPR questioned whether even the United States, with its vast resources, was able to do the same to its border with Mexico.
“What you call a fence has no value in military terms if it is not covered by observation of fire, because someone can hold and cut that obstacle to bridge it,” he said.
The military spokesman said building a security post every 2-5km and having drone surveillance would incur a “huge cost”. “You will have to invest in the infrastructure, as well as manpower,” he emphasised.
Speaking on the “terror-crime nexus”, the DG ISPR said cells of the banned Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) on the Pakistani side provided support to this network.
Similar to the strategy he explained for terrorists’ infiltration, Lt Gen Chaudhry said there were extremely coordinated attacks on the army and FC deployments on the routes. “[They] attack the posts and have smugglers’ vehicles pass from below,” he said.
He further said that non-custom-paid vehicles were a part of this network.
“If there are 0.40-0.45 million non-custom-paid vehicles moving in your province, then why do you not stop them? Who is to stop them […] why are they not stopping it, why are they not checking it, whose responsibility is this?” he asked.
“The non-customs paid vehicles are part of this political-terror-crime nexus, are being used in vehicle-borne improvised explosive devices and by these terrorists in their movement,” the DG ISPR said.
‘Afghan side could not deny evidence presented by Pakistan’
On the Pak-Afghan dialogue that broke down earlier this month, Lt Gen Chaudhry asserted that Pakistan’s stance was “absolutely clear”, with Islamabad conveying that the presence of TTP cells, and their funding and functioning from Afghan soil, was not acceptable.
“We presented all kinds of evidence, and they could not deny that evidence. It was absolutely clear to the mediators, as well as to the Afghans there,” the military spokesman highlighted.
