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Private bus owners in both Pakistan and Afghanistan providing transport for the Pak-Afghan “Dosti Bus Service” have said that the bus service had “failed” because hundreds of people illegally cross the Pak-Afghan border every day while travelling in other private buses which do not require proper travel documents. The bus service between Peshawar (in Pakistan) and Jalalabad (Afghanistan) started around a month ago. According to the transporters, the people preferred travelling in those buses because of strict visa procedures, which both the governments had promised to simplify once the bus service began. “People from both sides were freely crossing the border without visa or other legal documents in the presence of border security. He said that he informed the Afghan Transport Ministry about the problem two weeks ago, but it did not respond,” the Daily Times quoted Sartoor Khan, head of a transport company in Afghanistan, as saying. The transporters threatened to suspend the bus service if Pakistan and Afghan governments fail to honour “commitments made to them”. Sartoor and Zikria Khan, chairman of the United Transport Company of Pakistan, reportedly said that the Pakistan and Afghan governments had “failed to honour promises” to seal the border and stop illegal movement from both sides. “Both of us had told our governments that we would suspend the bus service if the illegal transport companies running their buses up to the Pak-Afghan border and exchanging passengers on both sides were not stopped by August 1,” they added. Zikria said that presently only three-five passengers travel by the ‘Dosti Bus’, while hundreds of people crossed the border illegally. He further complained that the NWFP government had approved land for the Pak-Afghan bus terminal, but documents in this regard had been pending with the Peshawar district nazim for signatures for the last two months. Sartoor said that both governments had promised to stop illegal movement of people across the border after the launch of the bus service, but the issue had not been resolved even after one month of the bus launch. Zikria said that illegal transporters were causing his company a Rs 100,000 loss every day. “We have reduced the number of buses from five to two from each side due to a lack of public interest and strict visa conditions, compelling passengers to travel by illegal transport. Within two days, we will reduce the number of buses to one from each side and suspend the service if the government does not heed our concerns by August 1,” he added.
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