Khyber Pakhtunkhwa belongs to Afghans, claims Mahmood Achakzai

PESHAWAR (92 News) – Pakhtunkhwa Milli Awami Party chief Mahmood Achakzai Khan has said that Khyber Pakhtunkhwa belongs to Afghans and they can live there without fear and irritation. In an interview with Afghanistan Times in Kabul, he said: “If Afghans are harassed in other parts of Pakistan, they should come here to the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa where no one can ask them for refugee cards, because it also belongs to them.” Achakzai said that he would not allow anyone to harass Afghan refugees in their “own land”. “Kabul and Islamabad should exercise extreme caution to resolve Torkham crossing conflict. Otherwise, they should leave the issue to the US and China, and they would resolve it within two weeks,” he said. The PkMAP chief said that Torkham and forcedly repatriation of Afghan refugees were two separate issues. “It not only raised concerns among Afghan officials in Afghanistan, but also made Pashtun leaders concerned in here,” he added. However, the PkMAP chief said that the Afghan paper presented his viewpoint in a wrong way. He said that he had not termed Khyber Pakhtunkhwa as part of Afghanistan.