“Durand Line is now Pak’s most dangerous front”, The Sunday Guardian, October 19, 25
“Ever since General Asim Munir (now self-appointed Field Marshal) took over as Army Chief, Pakistan has been engaged in conflict after conflict. A massive public outrage against the Army following the arrest of Imran Khan in May 2023; an exchange of missiles with Iran in January 2024; a crippling four-day conflict with India in May 2025; religious and sectarian violence, and now the open conflict with Afghanistan along the Durand Line, which threatens to extend into a long, bleeding war. Add to this the intensification of the freedom struggle in Balochistan and upheaval in Pakistan Occupied Kashmir. In all this, the Pakistani Army can legitimately claim to have attained victory in only one of its many conflicts—its war against its own people.
The eruption along the Durand Line was something that had to be coming. Waziristan—the rugged mountainous region adjoining Afghanistan in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province—had been on the boil for the past three years with the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), ostensibly supported by the Taliban regime in Afghanistan, gaining virtual control of the tribal area. Pakistan’s decision to deport Afghan refugees staying on its soil for almost a decade had rankled.
Pakistan claimed that TTP cadres crossed the Line to launch attacks and then fled back for sanctuary on the other side. The Taliban claimed that Pakistan harboured members of the ISIS—their bitter rival—on their soil. They also harboured resentment at the policy to relocate the Jaish-e-Mohammed and Lashkar-e Taiba to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa after Indian strikes at their bases in Punjab. All this has been merely in keeping with the Pakistani policy of “good terrorists” and “bad terrorists”. The tensions along the Afghan and Pakistani border had been rising, with increasing exchanges of fire from both sides, and the closure of border crossings. And now the pot was about to boil over…….”
Read full article at sundayguardianlive.com
