The Durand Line: Pain, politics, perception 

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When Mullah Mohammad Yaqoob Mujahid, Afghanistan’s acting defense minister, was recently pressed by Afghanistan’s Tolo News regarding allegations that the Taliban provides safe haven to militants striking Pakistan, he didn’t offer a diplomatic pivot or a standard denial. Instead, he reached for a grievance that predates the Taliban, the Cold War, and even the state of Pakistan itself.

“The real pain,” Yaqoob said, “is Durand.”

In those four words, Yaqoob distilled eight decades of regional toxicity— and even more before that. The Durand Line, the 1,600-mile border carved through the mountains by British colonial administrators in 1893, remains an open wound in Central Asia. To Islamabad, it is a settled international boundary. To Kabul— whether ruled by kings, communists, or clerics— it is a colonial fiction that sliced through the Pashtun heartland.

But a new scholarly intervention is challenging the emotional architecture of this Afghan narrative. Dr. Lutfur Rahman, a researcher from Lower Dir and an ethnic Pashtun, has spent years sifting through the “dust-covered files” of history to author Revisiting the Durand Line. His findings suggest that the “pain” Yaqoob describes may be less a matter of legal ambiguity and more a product of political utility.

The Afghan narrative has remained remarkably consistent for nearly eight decades, resting on four basic pillars: that Amir Abdur Rahman Khan signed the agreement under British duress; that he did not understand English; that the deal was a 100-year lease that expired in 1993; and that its legality perished with the British Raj.

The Afghan government may not accept legal arguments but should recognize this reality: the Pashtuns of Pakistan have consistently chosen Pakistan. Naimat Khan

The Afghan government may not accept legal arguments but should recognize this reality: the Pashtuns of Pakistan have consistently chosen Pakistan.

Dr. Rahman’s research, fueled by a deep dive into 60,000 files at the British Library and a chance encounter with a sealed copy of the agreement in Peshawar’s tribal archives, suggests these pillars are made of sand.

Documents show the Amir was no passive victim. He proactively wrote four letters to the Viceroy requesting that the border be drawn. Far from being confused, he was reportedly so pleased with the result that he spent 33,000 rupees hosting the British delegation and awarded Sir Mortimer Durand a “Golden Star” for his efforts.

The original agreement, Dr. Rahman argues, was drafted in Persian— the court language of Kabul— which the Amir understood perfectly. Rahman found no mention of a 100-year limit. Instead, he uncovered a succession of reaffirmations— in 1905, 1919, 1921, and 1930— where various Afghan rulers signed off on the frontier.

The legal crux, Dr. Rahman argues, lies in the Vienna Convention on Succession of States in respect of Treaties. Under international law, when British India dissolved in 1947, Pakistan inherited its borders. Boundary agreements, unlike trade deals, do not evaporate when a colonial power departs.

Rahman also points to what he describes as a historical irony: that Afghanistan benefited territorially from the 1893 agreement, gaining areas such as Asmar, Lalpur, and Barmal, which had not previously belonged to it. If the arrangement was accepted when it conferred advantages, he asks, on what grounds is it rejected now?

Despite this paper trail, Kabul has periodically challenged the validity of these agreements after 1947. Afghan officials and analysts have argued that treaties concluded under unequal power dynamics lack legitimacy, and some have questioned the authenticity of historical records themselves.

For Pakistan, this legal continuity is central: it sees itself as the successor to British India in respect of the frontier. For Afghanistan, however, the issue transcends legal frameworks. It is tied to identity, sovereignty, and domestic legitimacy.

That tension explains why no Afghan government— whether monarchical, republican, or Taliban— has formally recognized the Durand Line as an international border. As Amir Khan Muttaqi, acting Afghan foreign minister, has repeatedly emphasized, the issue is not merely governmental but national, because any deviation risks political backlash at home.

Yaqoob Mujahid’s remark captures only part of the paradox. The “pain” of Durand persists not because the line is undefined, but because it is invoked differently on either side. Yet the more decisive question lies elsewhere: not in Kabul’s rejection, but in whether those living along the frontier seek to undo it.

Would residents of Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa— many of whom share deep ethnic, linguistic, and familial ties across the border— support a redrawing of boundaries? The available evidence suggests otherwise. Over decades, their political, economic, and institutional integration has taken firm root within Pakistan. Whatever cultural continuities exist across the border, they have not translated into a popular demand for territorial revision.

The Afghan government may not accept legal arguments, but it should recognize this reality: the Pashtuns of Pakistan, who inhabit this side of the Durand Line, have consistently chosen Pakistan.

But the Taliban may never acknowledge this— at least publicly. And thus, the “pain” will continue to be invoked, complicating the prospects for lasting peace between the two neighboring Muslim nations.

© Arab News Pakistan