ISLAMABAD, 23 October 2003 — Pakistan has started fortifying its long border with Afghanistan with fences and checkpoints to prevent Al-Qaeda and Taleban fugitives from sneaking in, a military spokesman said yesterday.
New light towers and checkpoints were being erected along the barren western frontier around the town of Chaman, a main border crossing, about 750 kilometers southwest of the capital, Islamabad, to stop Afghan insurgents from reaching Pakistan, said Gen. Shaukat Sultan.
The traffic back and forth across the sparsely inhabited border region has been a source of contention between Pakistan and the Afghan government of President Hamid Karzai.
Karzai has accused the Pakistanis of sheltering fighters of the ousted Taleban regime and members of Al-Qaeda. Pakistan denies giving safe haven to Afghan insurgents. But the border area is the home of tribes who share the culture and view of the Taleban.
Pakistan says it is doing whatever possible to stop rebels from using its soil against Afghanistan’s fledging government.
Afghanistan’s state-run television Tuesday reported that Pakistan was constructing a 40-kilometer-long wall along the Afghan border without seeking permission from Karzai’s government.
Sultan said the report was inaccurate, and Pakistan was constructing no such wall. “We are only fencing our border to fight terrorism,” he told The Associated Press. Pakistan did not need permission from any country to take measures safeguarding its border, he added.
Chaman is across the border from Spin Boldak, an Afghan town where suspected Taleban and Al-Qaeda insurgents have often targeted US-led coalition forces.
Pakistan has been a key ally of the United States in war on terror and its forces have arrested more than 450 suspected Taleban and Al-Qaeda fighters since the US-led coalition forces began operations in 2001 in Afghanistan to oust the Taleban regime and punish the perpetrators of the Sept. 11 attacks in America.
