PESHAWAR – In a significant yet partial reopening, Pakistan has allowed the Torkham border crossing with Afghanistan to resume operations, specifically to facilitate the return of thousands of Afghan refugees, officials confirmed on Saturday.

Despite this development, stringent restrictions continue to apply to all other cross-border activities, including trade, maintaining a tense pause in commercial exchanges between the two nations.

Pakistan’s decision to close all border crossings with Afghanistan on October 12 followed a series of deadly skirmishes, with both sides reporting substantial casualties among their troops. This shutdown persisted for nearly three weeks, during which time countless Afghan refugees found themselves stranded, along with numerous trucks laden with goods, effectively halting critical trade routes.

The move towards reopening was possible after Pakistan and Afghanistan reached a mutual understanding to uphold a ceasefire, a resolution achieved through nearly a week of diplomatic efforts. Turkey and Qatar played pivotal roles in facilitating these negotiations, which aimed to avert a broader conflict in the already volatile region.

The reopening came after Pakistan and Afghanistan agreed to maintain a ceasefire following nearly weeklong negotiations facilitated by Turkey and Qatar aimed at preventing a wider conflict in the region.

Authorities said no new exchange of fire has been reported since the ceasefire along the 2,611-kilometer (1,622-mile) border, known as the Durand Line, which Afghanistan has never formally recognized.

Thousands of Afghan refugees had been moved to a temporary camp near the border, while hundreds more waited along the roadside for the crossing to reopen. Despite the partial reopening, trade across the frontier remains suspended on both sides.

Local officials at the Afghan side told The Associated Press that the gate was reopened Saturday morning exclusively for Afghan refugees, with thousands expected to cross back into Afghanistan throughout the day.

They urged all other travelers to refrain from using the crossing until further notice.

A video released by the Information and Culture Department of Afghanistan’s eastern Nangarhar province showed local officials and Afghan soldiers standing at the Torkham gate holding flowers to welcome returning refugees as they crossed back into their country.

The development came a day after Afghanistan’s ambassador to Pakistan, Ahmad Shakeeb, wrote on X that large numbers of Afghan refugees remained stranded because of Pakistan’s closure of border crossings.

On Friday, Pakistani Foreign Ministry spokesman Tahir Andrabi said the Afghan ambassador had violated diplomatic norms by airing his grievances on social media instead of communicating through Pakistan’s Foreign Ministry.

Since 2023, Pakistan has launched a campaign to deport immigrants living illegally in the country. More than a million Afghans have been repatriated as part of the effort.

Earlier this month, Pakistan’s military said it carried out airstrikes on the hideouts of the Pakistani Taliban inside Afghanistan, killing dozens of people it described as insurgents. Afghan officials denied the claim, saying civilians were among the dead, and said Afghan forces had struck Pakistani military posts in retaliation, killing 58 soldiers. Pakistan’s military acknowledged losing 23 troops in the fighting.

The violence prompted Qatar to invite delegations from both sides to Doha, where they agreed to a ceasefire on Oct. 19. It was followed by six days of talks in Istanbul that continued until Thursday night, when the two sides agreed to maintain the truce.

Pakistan has seen a sharp rise in militant attacks in recent months, most claimed by the Pakistani Taliban, known as Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan. The group, designated a terrorist organization by both the United States and the United Nations, is separate from the Afghan Taliban but has been emboldened by the Afghan group’s takeover of Kabul in 2021.