‘Rebels receiving arms from Pakistan’

JALALABAD (Pajhwok): Border police claim weapons are being smuggled into eastern provinces through various land routes from Pakistan for distribution to militants.

First border zone police commander, Col. Mohammad Ayub Hassankhel, told Pajhwok Afghan News during an exclusive interview that insurgents were supplied arms from Pakistan.

However, he said border guards had made many achievements in terms of preventing arms smuggling. He added they manned the 46,175-kilometre border that Nuristan, Nangarhar and Kunar shared with Pakistan.

He said the police had been able to curb arms smuggling through the border as hundreds of arms smuggled from Pakistan into eastern provinces had been seized during the current solar year.

During the period, he claimed, 235 armed insurgents were killed, hundreds others injured and more than 10 captured alive. In addition, millions of faked afghanis have been confiscated at the border crossing.

Hassankhel said the latest achievements by security organs in Nangarhar were commendable. “We have seized explosives, drugs and arms even at dry ports,” he said, rejecting as unfounded claims by some lawmakers that a number of districts in Nangarhar could fall into the hands of Taliban.

He also said a number of measures had been put in place to ensure the April elections passed off peacefully. He said no one would be allowed to disrupt the elections.

“I can confidently say no one can create chaos during the elections and we are very serious about it,” he said.

Hassankhel said joint operations would be launched soon to do away with the existing security threats in some border areas and the entire border region would be purged of armed militants.

He said local forces had no problems in securing areas transitioned to them from foreign counterparts.

He said Afghan forces travelled to areas in Kunar, where foreign troops had not been able to travel despite having modern equipment.

The commander acknowledged some border areas in Nuristan had no Afghan guards, but added Pakistani forces also did not exist in those areas.

He also claimed hundreds of youth daily visited border police authorities to join the forces.

He said there had been a dramatic increase in the number of young men wishing to join the border police, but sometimes they lacked the resources to absorb them.

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