The Kabul Tribune (KT)— A five-month-old Afghan baby with a heart condition has been allowed to enter Pakistan without travel documents on humanitarian grounds and was taken to a hospital in Peshawar for treatment, The Express Tribune reported.
The baby and the parents were granted special permission by Pakistani authorities to cross the Torkham border, according to Islam Badshah Afridi, a social worker in Khyber district.
The infant was transferred to the Hayatabad Medical Complex in Peshawar, where the child has been admitted and is receiving medical treatment.
Afridi welcomed the decision, saying it was the second case in which an Afghan child had been allowed to enter Pakistan through the Torkham crossing without documents on special humanitarian grounds to receive timely medical care, according to The Express Tribune.
The Torkham border, a key trade and transit route between Pakistan and Afghanistan, has remained closed since February amid tensions and intermittent clashes between Pakistani security forces and Taliban forces in Afghanistan.
Pakistan has introduced a new system for regulating cross-border movement, replacing an arrangement dating to the British colonial era under which residents of border areas in Afghanistan and Pakistan could travel across certain crossings without visas.
Previously, Afghans could use a tazkira, or Afghan identity document, to cross at designated points under longstanding easement rights.
The arrangement was originally intended to facilitate movement for families and tribes living on both sides of the border after the British demarcation of the frontier known as the Durand Line.
Pakistan has since implemented a “single-document regime” at all international border crossings with Afghanistan, requiring travelers to carry valid documentation.
Pakistani authorities have said the previous arrangement was sometimes misused, with people traveling beyond the areas covered by the traditional easement rights.
The humanitarian exception granted to the infant allows the child to receive medical treatment in Pakistan despite the broader restrictions on undocumented cross-border travel.
