Pakistan and Afghan officials met in Kabul on Saturday to find out a solution to the controversy over the issuance of visas in the eastern Afghan city of Jalalabad, which had led to the closure of the Pakistani consulate.
A senior Pakistani diplomat visited Afghan Foreign Ministry and met Afghan officials to solve the problem but failed to remove differences.
Pakistan on Friday shut down its consulate, citing Nangarhar Governor Hayatullah Hayat’s “undue intervention” in the affairs of the Pakistani diplomatic mission.
However, Governor Hayat denied interference in the affairs of the Pakistani consulate, but said he was “unhappy at the working of the consulate as money was being demanded for the issuance of visas. “A Pakistani visa was being sold at Rs 5,000 to 20,000,” he alleged.
A Pakistani Embassy official dismissed the allegations as “false and malicious” when Daily Times approached him in Kabul on Saturday.
The embassy in an early statement requested the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Afghanistan to refrain Governor Hayat from “interfering in the functioning” of the consulate.
The embassy said that the Nangarhar governor had interfered in the affairs of the Jalalabad consulate, which was a “complete violation of the Vienna Convention of the Consular Relations 1963”.
Governor Hayat told reporters that Afghan government had the right to “manage thousands of visa seekers and ensure their security,” according to the BBC Pashto radio.
Thousands of people daily gather outside the Pakistani consulate to get Pakistani visas, as many Afghans want to enter Pakistan for education, treatment, business and interaction with relatives.
Pakistani diplomatic missions had been facing a gigantic task to deal with thousands of visa applications after Pakistan imposed stringent border controls in June 2016. Afghans, who would enter Pakistan without visas, now need valid passports and visas to enter Pakistan via the Torkham crossing.
Pakistani officials say that Pakistani embassy and Jalalabad consulate issue nearly 3,000 visas to Afghans and the rejection rate is almost zero. “We normally issue visas to patients on the same day of their visit,” a Pakistani diplomat said.
The diplomat, requesting not to be identified, told Daily Times that the Nangarhar governor wanted to introduce a token system for Pakistani visa seekers to “earn money”.
“How can an Afghan governor introduce his own system for Pakistani visas and remove our security system outside the consulate,” the Pakistani official questioned, adding that the governor wanted to introduce of a system of nepotism in token system.
The Pakistani official said the consulate staff would not be able to work in an insecure environment as the consulate had been attacked in the past and its officials killed and kidnapped.
In November last year, a Pakistani diplomatic official was killed outside his residence in Jalalabad. At least seven people were killed in a Daesh attack on the Pakistani consulate in 2016.
Published in Daily Times, September 2nd 2018.
