TORKHAM, Pakistan — Although the Kabul airport has opened again to international flights, many Afghans are still trying to flee overland, through major border crossings like the one in Torkham, Pakistan.
Nestled into the mountainous valley of the Khyber Pass, used by traders and invaders from Alexander the Great to the British Empire, Torkham became a route that U.S.-backed mujahedeen took into Afghanistan in the 1980s. It is part of a region "caught between various empires," says Sarfraz Khan, a University of Peshawar international relations professor.
In recent years, Pakistan has tightened security. A 1,600-mile fence built in 2017 by the Pakistani military now climbs the dry, craggy mountain slopes and makes it harder to slip into Pakistan from Afghanistan.
Uncertainty after the Taliban seized power has helped create a backlog of deliveries, and brightly painted cargo trucks carrying everything from onions to construction materials can wait days to cross the border. While stuck, some truckers roll out carpets for an afternoon nap under the shade of their vehicles or gather with other drivers for tea.
Razziq Mehmon, 40, is an Afghan who is driving a truck loaded with cement bound for Jalalabad, the first major Afghan city across the border. His country has been at war his entire life. After the Soviets attacked his home village, his family fled and never returned. They're still in Afghanistan, internally displaced, their lives on hold. They, too, are waiting.
The road...
Read Full Story: https://www.npr.org/2021/09/14/1036416213/pakistan-afghanistan-border-taliban-torkham
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