Pakistan Army spokesperson Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry said the country makes no distinction between terrorist organisations and considers all militants a threat, adding that in Pakistan’s view “the only good terrorist is a dead terrorist.”
He alleged that the Taliban authorities, by supporting groups including al-Qaeda, Uyghur militants and Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), had become a source of regional instability.
Chaudhry warned that any country providing weapons to the Taliban would, in effect, be arming terrorism. Although he did not name a specific state, he said the Afghan Taliban had endangered regional security by offering sanctuary to ISIS, al-Qaeda and other groups.
He stressed that Pakistan’s dispute was with what he termed the Taliban regime, not with the people of Afghanistan, and said the Taliban did not represent the Afghan population. He criticised the group’s concentration of power and its complete exclusion of women, who make up half of Afghanistan’s population.
Addressing the tensions along the Afghanistan–Pakistan border, Chaudhry said the frontier was difficult to control because of the lack of functional administration on the Afghan side. He noted that areas such as Tira and Khyber had no visible courts, law-enforcement bodies or signs of state governance.
He pointed out that 29 tribes live divided across the border, with communities spread on both sides, making effective control of movement extremely challenging. He added that a border fence without surveillance and supporting fire held little military value, as it could easily be breached, and said that constructing posts every two to five kilometres and maintaining drone coverage required significant resources.
Responding to Taliban claims that Pakistani militants in Afghanistan were “guests,” he rejected the assertion, saying Pakistan would deal with such individuals according to its own laws.
Earlier, Taliban officials Khairullah Khairkhwa, the governor of Maidan Wardak, and Abdul Manan Omari, the deputy interior minister, had referred to militants from Waziristan as Afghanistan’s “guests.”
Chaudhry also commented on the closure of border crossings, saying trade could not continue in conditions of ongoing violence, and that the suspension of some routes was directly linked to security concerns and the protection of Pakistani citizens.
He reiterated Pakistan’s concern about US-supplied weapons left behind in Afghanistan, noting that American forces had abandoned military equipment worth an estimated $7.2 billion during their withdrawal, which he said posed risks to several countries in the region.
Chaudhry denied Taliban claims that Pakistan carried out attacks inside Afghanistan last week and repeated that Pakistan does not differentiate between terrorist groups.
