Armed clashes have broken out between Afghan and Pakistani tribes across the disputed border between those two countries, Peshawar-based Afghan Islamic Press reported on 14 March. The fighting reportedly pits the Tani tribe, on the Afghan side of the so-called Durand Line, with the Madakhayl, Wazir, Zeli Shakh, and Badarkhayl tribes residing in the northern Waziristan region of Pakistan. Both sides have laid claim to the Sutarki region.
The current border between Afghanistan and Pakistan -- known as the "Durand Line" after Sir Henry Mortimer Durand, the British signatory of the 1893 agreement that demarcated the border between Afghanistan and British India -- has never been officially recognized by Afghanistan, and has been at the core of disagreements between Afghanistan and Pakistan since the creation of Pakistan in 1947 |