Border crossing relaxed for Afghans on Eid, says official

LANDIKOTAL: Pakistan has relaxed the Torkham border crossing as a goodwill gesture to enable the Afghan citizens to celebrate Eid with their families in Afghanistan, an official said on Tuesday.

Yasir Arafat, additional director of the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) posted in Torkham told this scribe that the agency had set up various facilitation counters in Torkham.

He said Afghan citizens returning to Afghanistan for Eid were allowed to cross the border without visa and other legal documents.

The official said those, who stayed illegally in Pakistan, were also allowed to return to Afghanistan. He said those, who had Afghan national identity cards (Tazkira), were also permitted to cross the border and enter Afghanistan. He said extra staff members were posted in Torkham with a fast-track system to facilitate the Afghans.

He added the FIA offices would remain open for the next two days. He said roughly more than 30,000 Afghan citizens had so far returned to Afghanistan in the past three days. The official said that 20,000 more Afghan citizens were expected to leave Pakistan in the next two days.

Yasir Arafat said the border would be relaxed till the Thursday night 12 am, so that maximum passengers could avail the opportunity.

He said that no passenger would be allowed to enter Pakistan without legal travelling documents after Eid, adding that those who wanted to visit Pakistan must get a visa from Pakistan’s embassy in Kabul. He said those returning individually were processed in separate windows while children and elderly men and women along with their families were facilitated through the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) facilitation centre.

Afghanistan is celebrating Eid today (Wednesday) with Saudi Arabia as thousands of Afghan nationals in Pakistan have left for their country.