Resetting Pakistan-Afghanistan ties

The visit to Afghanistan last week by Ishaq Dar, Pakistan’s deputy prime minister and foreign minister, reflected an effort by both countries to reset ties after a prolonged period of escalating tensions. The Kabul visit was the first by a Pakistani foreign minister in four years and marked the resumption of senior-level diplomatic engagement.

Relations between the two neighbors plunged to a low when Pakistan faced a surge in terror attacks from across the border, which the Afghan authorities were unable or unwilling to stop. 2024 was a particularly deadly year with the highest number of casualties of Pakistani security personnel in militant violence in almost a decade. In fact, cross-border attacks into Pakistan rose sharply after the Taliban returned to power in Afghanistan in 2021. This upended Islamabad’s assumption that with the Taliban back at the helm, the stability of the country’s western border would be assured. The assumption about securing the border under Taliban rule turned out to be a strategic miscalculation.

Soon it became apparent that the Taliban takeover enabled the outlawed militant group, Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) to reorganize and escalate cross-border attacks, posing a serious security threat to Pakistan. The Taliban’s unwillingness to take action against the TTP became a source of growing frustration for Islamabad and friction between the two countries. Over three years of talks on the TTP between Pakistani officials and Taliban authorities yielded little. Pakistani officials urged Kabul to disarm the TTP, detain its leaders and rein in its violent activities. Taliban leaders offered assurances and asked for time, but did nothing.

 Reset in any case is a process, not an event. Its progress will depend in large part on how seriously the Taliban address Pakistan’s security concerns. 

Maleeha Lodhi

This forced Pakistan to adopt a tougher stance toward Kabul with a hiatus in significant diplomatic engagement in the past two years. Armed clashes increased on the border and a war of words frequently erupted between the two sides. The coercive policy Pakistan pursued had four key elements : 1) kinetic actions involving airstrikes against TTP hideouts in Afghanistan, the last such strikes taking place in December 2024 : 2) frequent public denunciations of the Taliban interim government for its failure to stop cross-border attacks and for “arming terrorists and providing a safe haven for them” : 3) restrictions on transit trade, which involved a ban on many items that could be imported by Afghanistan via Pakistan, as well as contraction in bilateral trade; and 4) expulsion of undocumented Afghans residing in Pakistan with plans to also deport those holding Afghan citizen cards issued by Pakistan a few years ago. 

These coercive actions were designed to raise the costs for the Taliban for their non-cooperation on the TTP. But the measures yielded limited results. In any case there were limits to how far Pakistan could go without risking a rupture in relations with Kabul, which was not in Pakistan’s interest. Late last year, Pakistani authorities decided diplomatic re-engagement with Kabul was necessary to prevent a breakdown in relations. Special envoy Mohammed Sadiq was dispatched to Kabul in December for talks aimed at de-escalating tensions and exploring possibilities for resolution of trade and security disputes. The talks were apparently making headway but were derailed by airstrikes carried out by Pakistani fighter jets on TTP sanctuaries in Afghanistan’s Paktika province. This was in retaliation to a TTP attack on a border post in Makin in late December which left 16 Pakistani security personnel dead. 

Diplomatic engagement however resumed with several trust-building trips made to Kabul by Sadiq and a visit in mid-April by the Afghan commerce minister Nooruddin Azizi to Islamabad. Last week, the Pakistan-Afghanistan Joint Coordination Committee (JCC) also met in Kabul after a 15-month pause. All this indicated a shift in Pakistan’s strategy away from only coercive actions and a one-item agenda involving TTP toward a broader, carrot-and-stick approach. 

It is against this backdrop that Dar undertook the trip to Kabul where he held talks with Afghanistan’s acting Prime Minister Muhammed Hassan Akhund, deputy prime minister Salam Hanafi and foreign minister Amir Khan Muttaqi. Talks were wide ranging, encompassing security, trade, transit and regional connectivity issues. On security, the Taliban are said to have promised to take several steps even though they did not meet Pakistan’s expectations. Nevertheless, in their public statements both sides pledged to prevent cross-border movement of militants. Islamabad will monitor the “results of steps taken by Kabul” according to a senior Pakistani official. That doesn’t mean Islamabad has given up the option of kinetic actions in response to any major cross border attack in which there are Pakistani casualties. The ‘stick’ remains in place. 
It is both on bilateral and transit trade that significant progress was made during Dar’s visit. Two pending agreements were concluded – the bilateral Preferential Trade Agreement (PTA), which responds to several Afghan ‘asks’ and will significantly expand commercial ties and the Afghanistan-Pakistan Transit Trade Agreement (APTTA), which meets a number of mutual needs. These are expected to be signed soon and implemented in the weeks ahead. They will boost trade relations, which Dar acknowledged had “slowed down” in the past two years. 

The Afghan side voiced concern over the forced repatriation of Afghan refugees from Pakistan. A statement from the Afghan prime minister’s office urged the Pakistani authorities to “end the mistreatment of Afghan refugees” and adopt a humane approach. Responding to this in his presser, Dar assured his hosts that Afghan nationals would be treated with respect and a mechanism will be established to report complaints overseen by the interior secretary. It was announced days later that Pakistan had set up a 24/7 helpline facility at the National Crisis Management Cell to assist Afghan nationals and address complaints of harassment during repatriation. 

Despite the return to diplomacy and effort to reset ties, the complex relationship between Pakistan and Afghanistan will continue to face challenges. Reset in any case is a process, not an event. Its progress will depend in large part on how seriously the Taliban address Pakistan’s security concerns. 

– Maleeha Lodhi is a former Pakistani ambassador to the US, UK & UN. She posts on X with @LodhiMaleeha