KABUL: Afghan interim government has called on Tehran to resolve bilateral issues “via diplomatic channels,” an Afghan official said on Monday.
Kabul Calls on Iran to resolve problems through diplomatic means
Hafiz Zia Ahmad, the deputy spokesperson of the Afghan Foreign Ministry, told the Arab News that they do not want to deteriorate their ties with neighboring countries and requested to all neighboring nations, including Iran, to settle the problems via diplomatic channels. He said that situation is normal, and they never favor escalation.
At least one Taliban official and 2 Iranian border guards were killed on Saturday when a shooting broke out between Afghanistan and Iran near a border post. The two sides accused each other of the firing incident.
The incident occurred amid a dispute over water to River Helmand, which flows from Afghanistan into Iran, as the two countries face worsening dearth exacerbated by the challenge of climate change.
The incident took place after Iran’s President Ebrahim Raisi warned the Afghan interim government earlier not to violate Iran’s water rights over the Helmand River, as laid out in a bilateral agreement inked in 1973.
Water rights are among other problems the two nations faced since the Taliban took control of Kabul in 2021.
Iran state-run IRNA news agency quoted Interior Minister Ahmad Vahidi as saying that “there is no issue at the present time” and that “everything is peaceful” at the Iran-Afghan border. Similarly, Gul Mohammed Qutrat, a police spokesperson in Nimroz, said issues at the border have been resolved.
