Durand Line is a settled issue: FO

Responding to a query regarding President Karzai’s recent press conference in Kabul, the spokesperson of the Foreign Office on Monday said that the Durand Line was a settled issue.

“Opening discussions on this issue is a distraction from the more pressing issues requiring the priority attention and cooperation of Pakistan and Afghanistan,” the spokesman said in a statement.

Moreover, the spokesman said when attention was drawn to the parts of the statement wherein the Afghan President urged Taliban to “turn and target” and “aim their weapons at” Afghanistan’s enemies, it was obvious that more work needed to be done to ensure peace and cooperation in the region.

He said that President Karzai had in the past asked Pakistan to use its influence on the Taliban to enter into dialogue for reconciliation process. Pakistan had responded positively to that call, he added. Moreover, he said that Pakistan would continue its support for the Afghan reconciliation process, rather than focusing on the negatives.

Referring to President Karzai’s remark that he visited Pakistan 19 times, the spokesperson said that Pakistan’s leadership had also travelled to Afghanistan several times to help build trust and strengthen bilateral relations.

Furthermore, he said that Pakistani post in Gursal had come under attack from Afghan forces and there had been several threatening and provocative statements made by Afghan leadership in this regard. He reiterated that the posts on Pakistan-Afghanistan border were serving useful and mutually beneficial purpose of better border management, which was crucial for interdicting cross border undesirable activity. He reaffirmed the need to use bilateral channels including military-to-military contacts to resolve the issues relating to posts.

In several high-level interactions in recent past, the leaderships of Afghanistan and Pakistan have agreed on the imperatives of a mechanism for an effective border management for the mutual benefit of the two countries.