Pakistan plans fence, mines on Afghan border

Islamabad, Dec 26: Pakistan plans to build a fence and lay landmines along parts of its border with Afghanistan in an effort to stop militants crossing into Afghanistan to battle NATO forces, a Pakistani official said today.

Relations between Pakistan and Afghanistan have deteriorated sharply this year over Afghan complaints Taliban fighters operate from sanctuaries on the Pakistani side of the unmarked frontier.

Pakistan has suggested building a fence but Afghanistan, which does not recognise the border, has opposed that, saying doing so would unfairly divide ethnic Pashtun communities that straddle both sides of the frontier.

Pakistani Foreign Secretary Riaz Mohammad Khan told a news conference in the capital, Islamabad, a decision had been made to build a fence and lay mines along some parts of the border.

''It will be done selectively ... the armed forces have been asked, they have been tasked, to work out the modalities,'' Khan said.

REUTERS