I am a Pakhtun and I want loy Afghanistan

nd hence all Pashtoons. I will strive to educate Pashtoons and will make arrangements for at-least one individual's education myself. I will strive for peace among Pashtoons through Jirga, Salisi and Nanawatay. I will help maintain cleanliness and greenery. I will help people. I will mobilize Pashtoons to help ourselves and never even think of foreign help, funds. I will strive to do the same for Pashtoons on either side of the Durand Line. I will respect the RIGHTS OF ALL ETHNIC GROUPS residing on either side of the Durand Line from the River Amu to River Indus and will strive for their rights in the same way as I will for Pashtoons'. I won't let anyone rule us, Pashtoons will live free of any influence and shall rule by ourselves. I will be the first to act on all these principles, will then mobilize my family, then neighbours and village/community and expand this chain to the whole Pashtoon population. I will strive for it till my death




The Durand Line refers to the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan, which is poorly marked and approximately 2,640 kilometers (1,610 miles) long. It was established after the 1893 Durand Line Agreement between the Government of colonial British India and Afghan Amir Abdur Rahman Khan for fixing the limit of their respective spheres of influence. It is named after Henry Mortimer Durand, the Foreign Secretary of British India at the time. The single-page agreement which contains seven short articles was signed by H. Durand and Amir Abdur Rahman Khan, agreeing not to exercise interference beyond the frontier line between Afghanistan and what was then colonial British India (now Pakistan).[1] A joint British-Afghan demarcation survey took place starting from 1894, covering some 800 miles of the border. The resulting Durand Line established the "Great Game" buffer zone between British and Russian interests in the region. This poorly marked border cuts through the Pashtun tribal area Although shown on most maps as the western international border of Pakistan, it is unrecognized by Afghanistan

History

The area in which the border runs has been inhabited by ethnic Pashtun tribes since at least the time of Alexander the Great in 330 BC.[13][14] The Greek historian Herodotus mentioned a people called Pactyans living on the eastern frontier of Arachosia as early as the 1st millennium BC.[15] The Baloch tribes inhabit the southern end of the line, which runs in the Balochistan region that separates the ethnic Baloch people. Arab Muslims conquered the area in the 7th century and introduced Islam to the Pashtuns (known then as ethnic Afghans). Some of the early Arabs also settled among the Pashtuns in the Sulaiman Mountains.[16] The Pashtun area (known today as the "Pashtunistan" region) became part of the Ghaznavid Empire in the 10th century followed by the Ghurids, Timurids, Mughals and Durranis.[citation needed]

In 1839, during the First Anglo-Afghan War, British-Indian forces reached deep into the Pashtun area and began war with the Afghan rulers. Two years later, in 1842, a large number of British-Indian forces were massacred and the war ended. The British again invaded Afghanistan in 1878, during the Second Anglo-Afghan War, but withdrew after a couple of years later. Mortimer Durand was deputed to Kabul in 1893 by the government of British India for the purpose of obtaining an agreement from Amir Abdur Rahman Khan to mark the boundary between Afghanistan and British India. It is believed that Abdur Rahman Khan showed his usual ability in diplomatic argument, his tenacity where his own views or claims were in debate, with a sure underlying insight into the real situation

On November 12, 1893, Abdur Rahman Khan and Mortimer Durand agreed to go ahead with marking a boundary line between Afghanistan and British India.[1] The two parties secretly camped at Parachinar (now part of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) of Pakistan), which is a small town near Khost in Afghanistan, for delimiting the frontier.[citation needed] There was no national consensus made in Afghanistan, and a majority of the population were unaware that their land was planned to be split in half. The resulting Durand Line Agreement or Durand Line Treaty would ensure the carving out of a new province called North-West Frontier Province (NWFP) out of annexed areas from Afghanistan, which are currently part of Pakistan and includes FATA and Frontier Regions. It also included the areas of Multan, Mianwali, the Bahawalpur, and Dera Ghazi Khan. These areas were under Afghan rule for over one thousand years, from at least the time of Sultan Mahmud of Ghazni rule in the 10th century. They were annexed with the Punjab Province of Pakistan as late as 1970, after one unit of Pakistan was dissolved by a former Pakistani President Yahya Khan, resulting in a shrunken NWFP as it exists today. From the British side, the camp was attended by Mortimer Durand and Sahibzada Abdul Qayyum, Political Agent Khyber Agency representing the British Viceroy and Governor General.[citation needed] The Afghan side was represented by Sahibzada Abdul Latif and a former governor of Khost province in Afghanistan, Sardar Shireendil Khan, representing Amir Abdur Rahman Khan.[citation needed] The original 1893 Durand Line Agreement was written in English, with translated copies in Dari or Pashto language. It is believed however that only the English version was actually signed by Amir Abdur Rahman Khan, a language which he could not read or understand

Demarcation Surveys on the Durand Line

The initial and primary demarcation, a joint Afghan-British survey and mapping effort, covered 800 miles and took place from 1894 to 1896. "The total length of the boundary which had been delimitated and demarcated between March 1894 and May 1896, amounted to 800 miles." Detailed topographic maps locating hundreds of boundary demarcation pillars were soon published and are available in the Survey of India collection at the British Library.[17] The complete 20-page text of these detailed joint Afghan-British demarcation surveys is available in several sources, which point out that "J. Donald and Sardar Shireendil Khan settled the boundary from Sikaram Peak (34-03 north, 69-57 east) to Laram Peak (33-13 north, 70-05 east) in a document dated 21 November 1894. This section was marked by 76 pillars. The boundary from Laram Peak to.....Khwaja Khidr (32-34 north)....was surveyed and marked by H.A. Anderson in concert with various Afghan chiefs....marked by (39) pillars which are described in a report dated 15 April 1895. King (issued a report dated) 8 March 1895 (on) the demarcation of the section from Khwaja Khidr to Domandi (31-55 north) by 31 pillars. The line from Domandi to New Chaman (30-55 north, 66-22 east) was marked by 92 pillars by a joint demarcation commission led by Henry McMahon and Sardar Gul Muhammad Khan (who issued a) report dated 26 February 1895. McMahon also led the demarcation commission with Muhammad Umar Khan which marked the boundary from new Chaman to....the tri-junction with Iran....by 94 pillars which are described in a report dated 13 May 1896." [18][19] In 1896, the long stretch from the Kabul River to China, including the Wakhan Corridor, was declared demarcated by virtue of its continuous, distinct watershed ridgeline, leaving only the section near the Khyber Pass which was finally demarcated in the treaty of 22 November 1921 signed by Mahmud Tarzi, "Chief of the Afghan Government for the conclusion of the treaty" and "Henry R. Dobbs, Envoy Extraordinary and Chief of the British Mission to Kabul." [18] A very short adjustment to the demarcation was made at Arandu (Arnawai) in 1933-34

British India declares war on Afghanistan

The Durand Line triggered a long-running controversy between the governments of Afghanistan and British India[1], especially after the outbreak of the Third Anglo-Afghan War when Afghanistan's capital (Kabul) and its eastern city of Jalalabad were air raided by the No. 31 and 114 squadrons of the British Royal Air Force in May 1919.[21][22] Nevertheless, Afghan rulers reaffirmed in the 1919, 1921, and 1930 treaties to accept the Indo-Afghan frontier.[10][18][23]

The Afghan Government accepts the Indo–Afghan frontier accepted by the late Amir[24]
—Article V of the August 8, 1919 Treaty of Rawalpindi

The two high contracting parties mutually accept the Indo-Afghan frontier as accepted by the Afghan Government under Article V of the Treaty concluded on August 8, 1919[24]
—Article II of the November 22, 1921 Anglo-Afghan Treaty

Territorial dispute between Afghanistan and Pakistan

Pakistan inherited the 1893 Durand Line Agreement after its partition from India in 1947 but there has never been a formal agreement or ratification between Islamabad and Kabul.[4] Pakistan believes that under uti possidetis juris it should not require one[10] because courts in several countries around the world and the Vienna Convention have universally upheld via uti possidetis juris that binding bilateral agreements are "passed down" to successor states, as is the case with some African nations.[25] Thus, a unilateral declaration by one party has no effect; boundary changes must be made bilaterally.[26][27] At the time of India's partition, the indigenous Pashtun people (including members of the Khudai Khidmatgar movement) living on the border with Afghanistan were only given the choice of either becoming a part of India or Pakistan.[5] Those who chose India had to sacrifice their native land by leaving it behind to move far away to India and adjust to a new environment living among non-Pashtuns.[28]

On July 26, 1949, when Afghan–Pakistan relations were rapidly deteriorating, a loya jirga was held in Afghanistan after a military aircraft from the Pakistan Air Force bombed a village on the Afghan side of the Durand Line. As a result of this violation the Afghan government on that day officially declared that the Durand Line is null and void. They also announced that the Durand ethnic division line had been imposed on them under coercion/duress and was a diktat.[29] This had no tangible effect as there has never been a move in the United Nations to enforce such a declaration due to both nations being constantly busy in wars with their other neighbors (See Indo-Pakistani wars and Civil war in Afghanistan). In 1950 the House of Commons of the United Kingdom held its view on the Afghan-Pakistan dispute over the Durand Line by stating:

His Majesty’s Government in the United Kingdom has seen with regret the disagreements between the Governments of Pakistan and Afghanistan about the status of the territories on the North West Frontier. It is His Majesty’s Government’s view that Pakistan is in international law the inheritor of the rights and duties of the old Government of India and of his Majesty’s Government in the United Kingdom in these territories and that the Durand Line is the international frontier.[30]
—Philip Noel-Baker , June 30, 1950

At the 1956 SEATO (Southeast Asia Treaty Organization) Ministerial Council Meeting held at Karachi, capital of Pakistan at the time, it was stated:

The members of the Council declared that their governments recognized that the sovereignty of Pakistan extends up to the Durand Line, the international boundary between Pakistan and Afghanistan, and it was consequently affirmed that the Treaty area referred to in Articles IV and VIII of the Treaty includes the area up to that Line.[31]
—SEATO , March 8, 1956

Pakistan withdrew from SEATO on November 7, 1973, and the organization was finally dissolved in June 1977. Islamabad interferes with Kabul

Pakistan's largest intelligence agency (ISI), which began with the birth of the nation, has been heavily involved in the affairs of Afghanistan since the late 1970s. During Operation Cyclone, the ISI with full support/funding from the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the White House in the United States recruited huge numbers of mujahideen military groups on the Pakistani side of the Durand line to cross into Afghanistan's territory for missions to destroy the Soviet-backed Afghan government.[32] After the collapse of the pro-Soviet Afghan government in 1992, Pakistan being well aware of its Durand Line Agreement violation (specifically article 2 where it mentions "The Government of India (Pakistan) will at no time exercise interference in the territories lying beyond this line on the side of Afghanistan") created a puppet state in Afghanistan run by the Taliban.[33] According to a summer 2001 report in the Friday Times, even the Taliban leaders challenged the very existence of the Durand Line when former Afghan Interior Minister Abdur Razzaq and a delegate of about 95 Taliban visited Pakistan.[34] The Taliban refused to endorse the Durand Line despite pressure from Islamabad, believing that there shall be no borders among Muslims. When the Taliban government was removed in late 2001, Afghan President Hamid Karzai has also began resisting the border.[35]

A line of hatred that raised a wall between the two brothers
—Hamid Karzai

Afghan Geodesy and Cartograpy Head Office (AGCHO) depicts the line on their maps as a de facto border, including naming the "Durand Line 2310 km (1893)" as an "International Boundary Line" on their home page.[36] However, a map in an article from the "General Secretary of The Government of Balochistan in Exile" extends the border of Afghanistan to the Indus River.[10] The Pashtun dominated Government of Afghanistan not only refuses to recognize the Durand Line as the international border between the two countries, it claims that the Pashtun territories of Pakistan rightly belong to Afghanistan.[9] Many in Afghanistan as well as some Pakistani politicians find the existence of the international boundary splitting ethnic Pashtun areas to be at least objectionable if not abhorrent.[37] Some argue that the 1893 treaty expired in 1993, after 100 years elapsed, and should be treated similar to the Convention for the Extension of Hong Kong Territory.[10][11][12][34][38] However, neither the relatively short Durand Line Agreement itself nor the much longer joint boundary demarcation documents that followed in 1894-6 make any mention of a time limit. In 2004, spokespersons of U.S. State Department's Office of the Geographer and Global Issues and British Foreign and Commonwealth Office also pointed out that the Durand Line Agreement has no mention of an expiration date. Recurrent claims that (the) Durand Treaty expired in 1993 are unfounded. Cartographic depictions of boundary conflict with each other, but Treaty depictions are clear.[4]
—A spokesperson for U.S. State Department’s Office of the Geographer and Global Issues

Afghan President Hamid Karzai and former Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf with Fakhruddin Ahmed, Chief Adviser (Prime Minister) of Bangladesh. Because the Durand Line divides the Pashtun and Baloch people, it continues to be a source of tension between the governments of Afghanistan and Pakistan.[39] In August 2007, Pakistani politician and the leader of Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam, Fazal-ur-Rehman, urged Afghanistan to recognise the Durand Line.[8] Press statements from 2005 to 2007 by former Pakistani President Musharraf calling for the building of a fence on the Durand Line have been met with resistance from numerous political parties within both countries.[40][41][42][43][44][45][46][47][48] Majority of the Pashtun politicians in both countries strenuously object to even the existence of the Durand Line border.[37] In 2006 Afghan President Hamid Karzai warned that "Iran and Pakistan and others are not fooling anyone." If they don’t stop, the consequences will be … that the region will suffer with us equally. In the past we have suffered alone; this time everybody will suffer with us.… Any effort to divide Afghanistan ethnically or weaken it will create the same thing in the neighboring countries. All the countries in the neighborhood have the same ethnic groups that we have, so they should know that it is a different ball game this time. Border skirmishes

Likely as a result of poor maps and/or poor or missing demarcation on the ground, over the past decade Pakistan's military had established bases up to one or two kilometers into Afghanistan in the Yaqubi area, as admitted by a spokesperson for Pakistan's bordering Mohmand Agency.[49] The Yaqubi and Yaqubi Kandao (Pass) area were later found to fall within Afghanistan.[50] In 2007, Pakistan errected fences and posts a few hundred meters inside Afghanistan, near the border-straddling bazaar of Angoor Ada in South Waziristan, but Afghan National Army quickly removed the fences and began shelling Pakistani positions.[51] Leaders in Pakistan said the fencing was a way to prevent Taliban militants from crossing over between the two nations but Afghan President Hamid Karzai believes it was meant to separate the Pashtun tribes.[52] Forces from the United States Army have been based at Shkin, Afghanistan, seven kilometers west of Angoor Ada, since 2002.[53][54] In 2009, the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) and American CIA have begun using MQ-1 Predator unmanned aerial vehicles from the Afghan side to hit targets on the Pakistan side.[55]
Afghan Border Police at Spin Boldak, which is seven km northwest of the Durand Line in the Kandahar province of Afghanistan, close to Chaman, Pakistan. The border area between Afghanistan and Pakistan has been one of the most dangerous places in the world for a long time now, which is largely due to no government control. Carrying weapons is legal in the area and many people walk around with guns including assault rifles.[56] A lot of illegal activities take place such as smuggling of weapons, narcotics, lumber, copper, gemstones, marble, vehicles, electronic products, as well as ordinary consumer goods.[39][57][58][59][60] Kidnappings and murders are also occuring very often.[7] Many outlaws or foreign terrorists came from other places and settled in the region during the past 30 years. The governments of Pakistan and Afghanistan both are currently trying to extend the rule of law into the border areas. At the same time, the United States is preparing the Reconstruction Opportunity Zones (ROZ) Act in Washington, D.C., which is suppose to help the economic status of the Pashtun and Baloch tribes by providing labor to a large number of the population on both sides of the Durand Line border.[61]

The Durand Line ethnic division matter has not reached the United Nations thus far, which could play a major role in settling the dispute between the two nations. The United States and United Kingdom both tend to ignore this sensitive issue because it could affect their war strategy in Afghanistan. Their involvement could leave strain relations and jeopardise their own national interests in the area.[9] Movement of people crossing the border has always been unchecked or uncontrolled by the governments[39], although those who present passports and visas are treated with etiquette by Pakistan's government. However, the local people who cross the border without documents view passport holders as traitors and some times they are found beheaded.