The Torkham border was reopened for cargo movement on Saturday, six days after being closed by the Afghan Taliban.

Pakistan border authorities said that thousands of trucks and cargo vehicles had been stuck due to the border closure and losses worth Rs270 million were suffered as a result.

Officials also said that pedestrian traffic had resumed on Friday.

A resident of Landi Kotal, where the border crossing is lcoated, had told a foreign news agency that gunfire had been heard before the border was closed.

Afghan authorities had later said that they had closed the border because the Pakistan government ‘was not fulfilling its promises’. These promises apparently included creating facilities for sick people and passengers on the border.

Pakistan’s defence minister and head of intelligence also visited Kabul from February 22 to 23 to discuss security matters.

The Torkham border crossing was reopened at 6am (0130 GMT) on Saturday, Afghan customs official Muslim Khaksar said at the site in Afghanistan’s eastern Nangarhar province.

“The border is now open from both sides for civilians as well as for traders,” he said.

“Trucks carrying rice, cement, construction material, medicines and other edibles were sent to Afghanistan,” a Pakistani customs official said, adding that lorries loaded with coal, vegetables and fruit had travelled the other way.

But around 1,400 trucks on the Pakistan side were still waiting to cross into Afghanistan as a backlog is cleared, he added.

Hundreds of people from both countries passed through the crossing on Saturday after being stranded for days, an AFP correspondent reported from the frontier.

“I was stranded here for five to six days with my sick mother,” Haroon, a resident of the Afghan city of Kunduz, told AFP before entering Pakistan with his ailing parent.

“There are thousands of patients like my mother waiting to go to Pakistan for treatment. The border must always remain open, it will help patients and also boost trade.”

The crossing was closed last Sunday by Afghan authorities, who objected to what they said were new documentation rules restricting people assisting medical patients from entering Pakistan.

Pakistani officials never confirmed or denied any rule change.

It was the first time the Torkham boundary had been officially closed since the Taliban returned to power in Afghanistan 18 months ago.

On Saturday, people attending to patients were allowed to enter Pakistan after showing their Afghan identity cards, the Pakistani customs official said.

Several patients in wheelchairs were escorted through the gates after border guards checked their documents.