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In October, Pakistani and Afghan forces traded fire across their shared border. It's part of a broader conflict between the neighbors over rising militancy in the region. Since then, borders between the countries have been closed with few exceptions. Trade has ground to a halt. Betsy Joles spoke to people who've been affected by this blockade, and sent us this report.
UNIDENTIFIED TRUCK DRIVER #1: (Non-English language spoken).
UNIDENTIFIED TRUCK DRIVER #2: (Non-English language spoken).
UNIDENTIFIED TRUCK DRIVER #1: (Non-English language spoken).
UNIDENTIFIED TRUCK DRIVER #2: (Non-English language spoken).
BETSY JOLES, BYLINE: Near the Pakistan-Afghanistan border, a group of truck drivers gathers around the dying coals of a campfire. They've been unable to get the goods they're carrying into Afghanistan.
UNIDENTIFIED TRUCK DRIVER #3: (Non-English language spoken).
JOLES: One of these drivers is an Afghan, Anwar Zadran, who was bound for Kabul with a truck full of cement. He's been stuck here on the Pakistan side for more than three months. Every day, Zadran wears the same thin clothes he arrived at the border in. When he hand-washes them, the winter sun is barely strong enough to dry them out.
ANWAR ZADRAN: (Non-English language spoken).
JOLES: "I wish the border would open soon so that we can get some relief," Zadran says.
Truck drivers on this route are used to intermittent closures of the border, which snakes for more than 1,600 miles between Pakistan and Afghanistan. These closures usually last a few weeks tops, but this one has stretched on much longer, disrupting business across the region. Shahid Hussain is a trader in the Pakistani city of Peshawar, some 40 miles from the border. On a small whiteboard in his office, he's written out alternate routes for his goods headed for Central Asia.
SHAHID HUSSAIN: Islamabad to Tashkent via Afghanistan - 1,581 kilometers.
JOLES: He's figuring out how to send these shipments through China instead of Afghanistan. Hussain compares his business of more than 20 years to a tree with its water supply cut off.
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UNIDENTIFIED NEWS ANCHOR: (Non-English language spoken).
JOLES: In early January, business leaders from Pakistan and Afghanistan formed a joint committee to assess the border situation. Jawad Hussain Kazmi heads the committee from the Pakistan side.
JAWAD HUSSAIN KAZMI: A one-point agenda (non-English language spoken).
JOLES: He says the Pakistani government has a one-point agenda when it comes to reopening the border, and that's improved security. Pakistan has seen an uptick in militant attacks on its soil since the Taliban took over Afghanistan in 2021. Many of these attacks have been carried out by the Tehrik-e Taliban Pakistan, also known as the Pakistan Taliban. Pakistan's prime minister, Shehbaz Sharif, said during a workshop in Islamabad in late January that his country wants the Taliban to stop harboring militant groups. But...
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PRIME MINISTER SHEHBAZ SHARIF: (Non-English language spoken).
JOLES: So Pakistan shut its borders. The Taliban government in Afghanistan has repeatedly rejected Pakistan's accusations. It sees the border closure as a pressure tactic from Islamabad and is seeking to diversify trade with India and others. The dispute has urgent consequences. One significant Pakistani export that is shut out of Afghanistan is medicine.
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JOLES: At a wholesale market in Peshawar, shopkeepers pack medical supplies into cardboard boxes.
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JOLES: Afghanistan relies on Pakistan for more than 60% of its medicine, and Pakistan's yearly pharmaceutical exports there are worth around $200 million. In addition to wholesale buyers, shopkeepers say Afghan patients visit the market to buy medicine in bulk that's hard to get in their country. Aslam Pervez, a business owner and trade leader here, says he worries for patients who are insulin dependent.
ASLAM PERVEZ: Insulin-dependent patient there (ph).
JOLES: He says, for them, it can be life-threatening.
PERVEZ: (Non-English language spoken).
JOLES: "We can't change our neighbor," Pervez says. "It's the people from both sides who are going to be the losers." With Wasim Sajjad in Peshawar, I'm Betsy Joles for NPR News.
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