Pak Army Chief Says Banned Outfits Enjoy “Sanctuary, Liberty of Action” on Afghan Soil

On Friday, in a statement, the Taliban’s Deputy Prime Minister for Economics, announced that awarded companies have started the extraction process of iron and lead mines.

The statement stressed that the work of the first block of the iron mine in Ghurian district has been entrusted to "Watan Derakhshan", an Iranian company.

The second block of iron mine in Ghurian district has been awarded to “Sahil Sharq Miana, Afghani Dare Noor Company” and to a Turkish company.

The third block of this mine has been awarded to "Shemesh-e-Melli" whose shareholders are “GBM” and “AD Resources”, two British companies.

The fourth block of this mine has been awarded to Bakhtar Steel Company, which is in a joint venture with two Iranian companies.

According to the Taliban’s statement, a block of a lead mine in Ghor Province has also been given to the Afghan Investment Company.

TTP issued the statement in response to a tribal jirga organised by the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam party in Peshawar city.

On Friday, Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam, led by Maulana Fazal-ur-Rehman, held a tribal jirga in the city of Peshawar and announced that "the extremists enter Pakistan from Afghanistan”.

The jirga was held after a bloody explosion in Bajaur district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, which targeted a gathering of Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam and left 63 dead and 200 injured. ISIS Khorasan had taken responsibility for the attack.

In response to Maulana Fazal-ur-Rahman's statement about how "terrorists use Afghan soil", Mohammad Khorasani, the spokesperson of TTP, said that Pakistani authorities blame others for their failures in the security sphere of Pakistan.

After the takeover of Afghanistan by the Taliban in August 2021, attacks against Pakistani security forces have increased. The government of Pakistan has claimed that Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) has safe havens in Afghanistan. Both the Afghan Taliban and TTP have denied Islamabad’s claims.

Sources said that the Taliban group is worried about domestic reactions and does not want to publicise the decree.

Islamabad asked the Taliban to publicise the decree in order to prevent the attacks of Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and its Afghan supporters.

According to the sources, Asif Durrani, Pakistan's special representative for Afghanistan affairs, last month had met with Taliban’s foreign minister Amir Khan Muttaqi and interior minister Sirajuddin Haqqani and discussed the decree.

Sources said that the order of the leader of the Taliban has been communicated to the Pakistani authorities to show the group’s determination that Afghan soil is not a threat to Islamabad.

Currently, the decree of Akhundzada has been delivered to Taliban officials and individuals, including Mullah Yaqoob, the Taliban's Minister of Defence.

Mullah Yaqoob was the first to have implied the presence of a decree to ban Jihad in Pakistan.

The Taliban's defence minister announced last week that if someone goes outside of Afghanistan with the intention of jihad, his work is not called jihad.

He said, "If the Emir [leader] stops the Mujahideen from fighting and they still go to fight, this war is not called Jihad."

The Taliban-controlled Afghanistan National Television had broadcast the Taliban’s defence minister’s statement on Saturday.

According to Ghasemzadeh, these people wanted to enter Iran "illegally".

Tasnim news agency reported on Sunday that these Afghans have been identified and arrested from the borders of Sistan and Baluchistan province of Iran.

The commander of Zabul border regiment said that those who enter Iran illegally will be expelled from the country.

Ghasemzadeh added that Iran's border guards will deal with the illegal movement and residence of unauthorised foreigners in Sistan and Baluchistan province seriously.

After the Taliban’s takeover of Afghanistan in August 2021, thousands of Afghan citizens fled to neighbouring countries, including Iran.

However, the authorities of the Islamic Republic deport thousands of Afghans from Iran every week because they do not have valid residence documents.

Some Iranian officials have said that the number of Afghans living in Iran is about five million people, but others have estimated this figure to be seven million.

The statement said that the NRF fighters attacked five members of the Taliban who were crossing the area.

It has been claimed that because of the NRF fighters’ attack, one member of the Taliban had been injured, and four others were killed.

The Taliban has not reacted to NRF’s statement.

The National Resistance Front of Afghanistan, led by Ahmad Massoud, is one of the military fronts which fights against the Taliban since the fall of Kabul in August 2021.