Border Talk Crosses The Line In Afghanistan

Foreign diplomats visiting Kabul tread carefully when it comes to the Durand Line, knowing full well that the colonial-era border separating British India and Afghanistan is a touchy subject. It was no secret that Washington considers the Durand Line — established by British India and the Kingdom of Afghanistan in 1893 — the modern-day border between Afghanistan and Pakistan.

State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland offered reminders of that fact during an October 23 press briefing in which she was questioned about Grossman’s comment. “Our policy on this has not changed,” she said. “It was correctly stated by Ambassador Grossman that we see this as the internationally recognized boundary.”.
But the comments have nevertheless raised hackles in Afghanistan, which has not recognized the Durand Line as its eastern border since Pakistan’s partition from the British Raj in 1947.

The Afghan daily “Weesa” this week quoted several Afghan lawmakers describing Grossman’s statement as interference in domestic Afghan affairs.

‘An Issue For Pashtuns, And Pashtuns Only’

The Durand Line is indeed divisive. It runs directly through traditional Pashtun lands, splitting one of the world’s largest tribal societies in two. Those to the west of the line are Afghan; to the east Pakistani.

Abdul Ghafoor Liwal, the head of Kabul’s Center for Regional Studies of Afghanistan, says the Durand Line is considered a top national issue in the country, but one that is up to the Pashtuns themselves to decide.

“Recognizing the legitimacy of this line is in the hands of the masses that live on either side of the border. This is also the formal position of the Afghan government,” Liwal says. “This is why the Afghan government has protested against this [Grossman’s] statement.”

But there are those in Afghanistan who would rather not be reminded of that fact. “I think talking about such [controversial] issues will have negative consequences for relations between America and the people of Afghanistan,” Aryan Yoon, a member of the foreign-relations committee of the Afghan parliament, said this week. “I think it will benefit both countries if we desist from talking about such issues.”

Liwal, whose government-funded think tank researches strategic and foreign-policy issues, says most Afghans still dream of a return of the much bigger and united Afghanistan that existed before the advent of European colonialism in South Asia.

Modern Afghanistan emerged from the fragmentation of the Durrani dynasty, an 18th-century Pashtun empire based in the southern Afghan city of Kandahar. Internal rivalries and wars eventually weakened the dynasty’s hold on regions that today constitute Pakistan and northern India.

Afghans in the both side of the Durandline are bond by blood, religion, culture, ethnicity and language & can’t be divided #LoyAfghanistan

Kunar Rocket Attacks are Attempt to get Afghanistan to Recognise Durand Line.

Rocket attacks from Pakistan on Nuristan and Kunar provinces seek to pressure the Afghan government into recognising the Durand Line, the Afghan National Army’s chief of staff, Shir Mohammad Karimi, said on Tuesday.
Afghan senators had summoned General Karimi and other Afghan security officials to explain the recent cross-border shelling in the two provinces.

Officials said Pakistan was behind the attacks and blamed the country’s Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) agency and the army for the rockets.

General Karimi told lawmakers that the issue had been brought up with Nato and US officials a number of times.

“We asked Nato to put pressure on Pakistan several times,” General Karimi said. “But it is still unclear why Nato is not taking the issue seriously. Maybe they fear for their supply trucks or [Pakistan’s status as a] nuclear power,”

The Afghan Minister of Interior echoed General Karimi’s stance and said that nearly 1,000 rockets had landed in Afghanistan’s border regions since the start of this year.

“There is no doubt that the ISI and Pakistan’s army are continuing to fire rockets into Kunar province,” said Minister of Interior Bismillah Khan Mohammadi. He added that the Afghan security forces awaited orders from President Hamid Karzai and the Afghan parliament to take action against Pakistan.

He added that Pakistan’s army had penetrated 2 kilometres into Afghan territory.

“Look at these photos that we have collected with the help of local residents,” General Khan said. “The Taliban does not have such heavy artillery; only Pakistan’s army has this.”

Deputy Head of Operations at the National Directorate of Security, Mohammad Yasin Zia, told the Senate he believes that Pakistan’s army is attempting to place Pakistani spies in the houses left vacant by fleeing Afghans.

“These rockets are fired by Pakistan’s army 100 per cent; we reject the claims of Pakistani officials of rocket attacks from Afghanistan,” Dr Zia added.

At the end of the session Afghan senators voted that Afghan forces should take action against Pakistan.

The maximum borders of Pashtunistan (shadowed in blue) and the Durand Line border in red The Pash­tuns, and their tribes strad­dle the polit­i­cal bound­ary between Pak­istan and Afghanistan. “Pash­tunistan,” a coun­try that exists in only a cul­tural con­text, encom­pass­ing all the Pash­tun peo­ple from both sides of the boarder. The red line on the map was drawn when British India pushed north into Afghan ter­ri­tory and the Afghan King ceded that land. How­ever, the bor­der has always been fluid– many Pash­tuns grew up par­tially in Pak­istan and travel between Jalal­abad and Peshawar reg­u­larly. Thou­sands of Afghan Pash­tuns moved east­ward dur­ing the Soviet inva­sion or dur­ing the Mujahideen fought civil war that fol­lowed or when the Tal­iban gov­ern­ment seized power. They still have rel­a­tives there, who speak the same lan­guage and fol­low the same Pash­tun­wali code of ethics and honor. Pash­tun peo­ple don’t even need a pass­port to cross the boarder over the Kyber pass. Haz­zaras and Tajiks will be has­sled and need proper doc­u­men­ta­tion. Pashto speak­ers who look the part get waved in. Polit­i­cally we are in Afghanistan but cul­tur­ally we’re slip­ping into Pakistan.
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The maximum borders of Pashtunistan (shadowed in blue) and the Durand Line border in red


The Pash­tuns, and their tribes strad­dle the polit­i­cal bound­ary between Pak­istan and Afghanistan. “Pash­tunistan,” a coun­try that exists in only a cul­tural con­text, encom­pass­ing all the Pash­tun peo­ple from both sides of the boarder. The red line on the map was drawn when British India pushed north into Afghan ter­ri­tory and the Afghan King ceded that land. How­ever, the bor­der has always been fluid– many Pash­tuns grew up par­tially in Pak­istan and travel between Jalal­abad and Peshawar reg­u­larly. Thou­sands of Afghan Pash­tuns moved east­ward dur­ing the Soviet inva­sion or dur­ing the Mujahideen fought civil war that fol­lowed or when the Tal­iban gov­ern­ment seized power. They still have rel­a­tives there, who speak the same lan­guage and fol­low the same Pash­tun­wali code of ethics and honor. Pash­tun peo­ple don’t even need a pass­port to cross the boarder over the Kyber pass. Haz­zaras and Tajiks will be has­sled and need proper doc­u­men­ta­tion. Pashto speak­ers who look the part get waved in. Polit­i­cally we are in Afghanistan but cul­tur­ally we’re slip­ping into Pakistan.

Pakhtunistan (Pashto: پښتونستان) or Pashtunistan,meaning the “land of Pakhtuns” or “land of Pashtuns”, is a modern term used for the historical region inhabited by the native Afghans or Pashtun (Pakhtun people) since at least the 1st millennium BC Possibly since at least the 3rd century CE and onward, the region was mostly recognized as Afghanistan and by the people in the Indian subcontinent as Pathanistan. Pashtunistan was politically divided in 1893 by the Durand Line, a disputed and poorly-marked border between Afghanistan and British India. The Durand Line was demarcated by the British and signed into a treaty in 1893 with the Afghan ruler Amir Abdur Rehman Khan. The treaty was to stay in force for a 100-year period. According to Afrasiab Khattak, a political analyst, the areas from the Khayber Agency Northwards to Chitral, however, remained un-demarcated. The Durand Line was a deliberate strategy designed to divide the Pashtun territory along the border region of Afghanistan and Pakistan. This disputed land was legally to be returned to Afghanistan in 1993 after the 100 year old Durand Treaty expired, similar to how Hong Kong was returned to China. Kabul has refused to renew the Durand Line treaty since 1993 when it expired, Throughout the last nine years, Pakistan has tried to get Afghan Warlords and Taliban to sign a renewal contract of the Treaty, and thankfully they didn’t not fall for the treachery of Pakistan. One of the reasons Pakistan faced problems with the Kabul rulers right from its inception was Kabul’s claim over the North West frontier Province. (NWFP) Kabul never accepted that line or the fact that the NWFP (Khyber pakhtunkhwa now) is part of Pakistan. This was one of the main policy planks used by President Daoud Khan’s government when it tried to foment trouble by Pashtoons nationalists in the NWFP on the issue of greater Pashtunistan. Until this day, the disputed land which rightfully and legally belongs to Afghanistan, is still recognized as the North-West Frontier Province, NWFP or Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Since the 2nd millennium BC, the region now inhabited by the native Pashtun people have been influenced by early Aryan tribes, the Medes, Achaemenids, Greeks, Mauryas, Kushans, Hephthalites, Sassanids, Arab Muslims, Turks, and others. The area in which the Durand Line lays has been inhabited by the indigenous Pakhtuns since ancient time, at least since 500 B.C. The Greek historian Herodotus mentioned a people called Pactyans living in and around Arachosia as early as the 1st millennium BC
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Pakhtunistan (Pashto: پښتونستان) or Pashtunistan,meaning the “land of Pakhtuns” or “land of Pashtuns”, is a modern term used for the historical region inhabited by the native Afghans or Pashtun (Pakhtun people) since at least the 1st millennium BC Possibly since at least the 3rd century CE and onward, the region was mostly recognized as Afghanistan and by the people in the Indian subcontinent as Pathanistan.

Pashtunistan was politically divided in 1893 by the Durand Line, a disputed and poorly-marked border between Afghanistan and British India. The Durand Line was demarcated by the British and signed into a treaty in 1893 with the Afghan ruler Amir Abdur Rehman Khan. The treaty was to stay in force for a 100-year period. According to Afrasiab Khattak, a political analyst, the areas from the Khayber Agency Northwards to Chitral, however, remained un-demarcated.

The Durand Line was a deliberate strategy designed to divide the Pashtun territory along the border region of Afghanistan and Pakistan. This disputed land was legally to be returned to Afghanistan in 1993 after the 100 year old Durand Treaty expired, similar to how Hong Kong was returned to China. Kabul has refused to renew the Durand Line treaty since 1993 when it expired, Throughout the last nine years, Pakistan has tried to get Afghan Warlords and Taliban to sign a renewal contract of the Treaty, and thankfully they didn’t not fall for the treachery of Pakistan. One of the reasons Pakistan faced problems with the Kabul rulers right from its inception was Kabul’s claim over the North West frontier Province. (NWFP) Kabul never accepted that line or the fact that the NWFP (Khyber pakhtunkhwa now) is part of Pakistan. This was one of the main policy planks used by President Daoud Khan’s government when it tried to foment trouble by Pashtoons nationalists in the NWFP on the issue of greater Pashtunistan. Until this day, the disputed land which rightfully and legally belongs to Afghanistan, is still recognized as the North-West Frontier Province, NWFP or Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

Since the 2nd millennium BC, the region now inhabited by the native Pashtun people have been influenced by early Aryan tribes, the Medes, Achaemenids, Greeks, Mauryas, Kushans, Hephthalites, Sassanids, Arab Muslims, Turks, and others. The area in which the Durand Line lays has been inhabited by the indigenous Pakhtuns since ancient time, at least since 500 B.C. The Greek historian Herodotus mentioned a people called Pactyans living in and around Arachosia as early as the 1st millennium BC