LANDI KOTAL (Khyber Agency), Sept 12: The import of timber has intensified because of the ruthless felling of trees in Afghanistan during the past few months.

Logs of Afghan timber could be seen piled up in Torkham on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border, awaiting onward transportation to various parts of the country.

The import and sale of Afghan timber is legal as tribal timber merchants pay custom duty at Torkham check-post.

Only the acquisition of route permits, issued by the political administration, hinders the tribal merchants in this regard. Each route permit costs them Rs22,000 in addition to Rs47,000 that they pay as customs duty for every truck carrying 600 feet of timber.

Criticizing political authorities for what he termed “overcharging” them for the issuance of route permits, Masood Khan, a timber dealer in Landi Kotal said that the import of Afghan timber could help conserve the local forests from illegal cutting. Terming the amount that they had to pay for each truck was unjust, he said that it overburdened them as they already had to pay a huge amount under the head of customs duty.

The better quality and competitive price of the imported timber has led to a quantum leap in the import of the Afghan timber during the past two-and-a—half months.

Torkham has become a bustling market almost overnight with dealers from all over the country, specially from Lahore and Karachi, converging here to acquire the finest timber in bulk quantities.

The imported timber mostly originates from the forests of the Kunar province in Afghanistan that are controlled by Nangrahar province’s governor Haji Din Mohammad and his security chief Hazrat Ali, Afghans passing through Torkham told this correspondent, adding that they remain oblivious to repeated calls from the Karzai government for stopping the cutting of forests.

Tilawat Shah, a resident of the Surkh Roed area in Nangrahar, accused Hazrat Ali and his men of being involved in the ruthless cutting of forests, earning huge amounts of money through its trade.

The forest mafia, as Mr Shah called them, charged Rs300,000 for every truck passing from Kunar to Jalalabad, where the trucks came under the “protection” of Haji Zahir for onward transportation to Torkham. Haji Zahir, son of former Nangrahar governor Haji Qadeer, too, charged truckers for providing them security upto the border area.

Some of the Nangrahar residents told this correspondent in Torkham that the so-called timber mafia in Jalalabad had started cutting Spin Ghar forests situated at Debala, Roedad and Khugiyane areas of the Nanagrahar province. Khugiyane is the home town of the Nanagrahar governor.