Pakistan rules out possibility of India-Afghan trade through Wagah border

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan will not allow Afghanistan to import goods from India via the Wagah border, saying that the transit trade was a bilateral and not a trilateral issue, according to a media report.

Pakistan Prime Minister's Adviser to Commerce Abdul Razak Dawood said this during a press conference on Wednesday.

“We have asked Afghanistan for not linking trade access through Wagah border and they agreed to it because the transit trade was a bilateral issue and it was not a trilateral thing to bring any other into it,” Dawood was quoted as saying by The News.

The official, who would be visiting Afghanistan later this month, said that the Afghan side is about to raise the issue of access through the Wagah border but he made it clear that they should not link the bilateral issue at a forum that was not trilateral and they agreed to it.

On suspension of trade with India, Dawood replied he would respond after considering all aspects.

Pakistan on Wednesday expelled Indian High Commissioner Ajay Bisaria after it decided to downgrade the diplomatic ties with India over what it called New Delhi's "unilateral and illegal" move to revoke the special status of Jammu and Kashmir.

"We will call back our ambassador from Delhi and send back their" envoy, foreign minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi announced in televised comments, while a government statement declared that Pakistan will also suspend bilateral trade.