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Pakistan-Afghanistan border opens after a month of closure

Pakistan-Afghanistan border opens after a month of closure | iNFOnews.ca
A Pakistani police officer stands guard while his colleagues searching a car at a checkpoint on the highway leading to Torkhum, a border crossing between Pakistan Afghanistan, Monday, March, 20, 2017. Pakistan's prime minister ordered the reopening of the country's border with Afghanistan on Monday, ending a protracted closure that has cost businesses on both sides millions of dollars and deepened tensions between the two neighbors. (AP Photo/Matiullah Achakzai)

PESHAWAR, Pakistan – A Pakistani border official says hundreds of trucks have crossed into Afghanistan from Pakistan after the border reopened for the first time in more than a month, ending the protracted closure of one South Asia’s busiest trade routes.

Fayaz Khan at Pakistan’s Torkham border crossing says Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s order to open the border was received late on Monday. He says that as a result, the border opened for business at 7 a.m. on Tuesday.

The long-stranded convoy of trucks that stretched for miles on either side began to move.

Pakistan closed the border in mid-February, following a string of militant attacks that Islamabad has blamed on militants hiding in Afghanistan.

Pakistan and Afghanistan often accuse the other of harbouring militants.

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Abbey Westbury

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