PESHAWAR, March 9: The Awami National Party has voiced its strong opposition to the government’s proposal of fencing or mining the border with Afghanistan to stop cross-border movement.
In a press statement issued here on Thursday, ANP president Asfandyar Wali Khan termed the move an effort to divert attention from the government’s failure to adopt and implement a clear-cut Afghan policy.
He said that the party would not allow fencing or planting landmines along the common border with Afghanistan, adding that such steps were required between two enemies, while the people living on both side of the border were brothers and interconnected by age-old cultural, religious and economic relations.
The nationalist leader said that the party had been calling for expanding rail and road links with Afghanistan to promote trade and cultural ties but the Pakistani government were talking of closing down the centuries-old trade routes.
He said that such statements were likely to create anxiety among the Pakhtuns on both sides of the border.
He said that while other countries wanted to strengthen cultural and trade cooperation with their neighbours, the government’s wrong policies had brought Pakistan at the verge of crisis with its neighbours. He stressed the need for a peaceful and diplomatic solution to the current crisis with Afghanistan.
He said that wrong policies of the government had promoted religious extremism in the country, adding that local extremist organisations were supporting guests of the establishment in tribal areas.
He regretted the killing of innocent people, including children and women, in Waziristan in the name of the so-called war on terror and said that there was no terrorist there, adding that all tribesmen were extremely patriotic.
