The Fragile Frontier: Pakistan and Afghanistan’s Uneasy Ceasefire and the Battle for Control

Fatima Umer Madani, Msc International Development and Humanitarian Emergencies

The recently brokered ceasefire between Pakistan and Afghanistan, mediated by Qatar and Türkiye, represents a temporary pause in their long-standing border conflict. It highlights persistent structural challenges such as weak state institutions, limited trust, informal border economies, and the influence of militant networks. Without enforcement mechanisms or shared incentives, the agreement risks reversal and shows how diplomacy may manage tension without addressing the underlying causes of instability.

A Precarious Peace at the Edge of Conflict

Pakistan’s newly announced ceasefire with Afghanistan reflects the uneasy balance between diplomacy and insecurity that has long shaped their shared border. The truce follows a series of deadly exchanges that show how fragile regional stability remains when political trust is low and non-state actors operate beyond control.

In an interview after the agreement, Defence Minister Khawaja Muhammad Asif said that “everything hinges on one clause,” referring to Kabul’s ability to restrain militant groups launching attacks into Pakistani territory. His statement highlights that the ceasefire is a conditional pause rather than a reconciliation. It depends on Afghanistan’s capacity to provide security guarantees it has historically failed to uphold. This condition exposes the imbalance between the two states, since Pakistan holds Afghanistan responsible for cross-border militancy while Kabul views such pressure as interference in its sovereignty.

The Taliban’s return to power in 2021 was initially seen in Islamabad as a strategic win. A friendly government in Kabul was expected to secure the western frontier and ensure ideological alignment. Four years later, that assumption has collapsed. Cross-border attacks have increased, and the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) has re-emerged as a major threat. Hundreds of attacks have targeted Pakistani forces, leading to retaliatory airstrikes in Kabul and Paktika. The ceasefire is therefore an admission that military responses alone have failed to create lasting stability.

Armed Taliban security forces stand watch near the sealed Zero Point border crossing between Afghanistan and Pakistan in Spin Boldak , Kandahar province. (Sanaullah Seiam/AFP/Getty Images)

Diplomacy Under Pressure

The agreement represents a political compromise driven more by necessity than mutual confidence. For Pakistan, continued confrontation risks overstretching an already fragile economy and worsening domestic instability. For Afghanistan, facing isolation and sanctions, the truce offers a chance to avoid escalation with a neighbour that controls essential trade routes and remittance flows.

The ceasefire functions as a temporary pause rather than a resolution of disputes over sovereignty, militancy, and credibility. Islamabad demands verifiable action against TTP networks allegedly operating inside Afghanistan, while Kabul denies these claims and argues that Pakistan uses them as a pretext for incursions that violate Afghan sovereignty. Both sides use the conflict to reinforce domestic legitimacy. Pakistan presents itself as the victim of external aggression, and Afghanistan portrays itself as the defender of independence. The result is a fragile equilibrium where both claim restraint but neither accepts responsibility. The principle of mutual restraint remains unenforceable because there is no independent verification system, no neutral mediator, and no shared definition of a breach. Pakistan views any cross-border attack as a violation, while Afghanistan views Pakistani retaliatory airstrikes as disproportionate and illegitimate. Without institutional mechanisms, both governments will continue to interpret events through opposing political lenses.

Structural Conditions of Conflict

The persistence of Pakistan-Afghanistan border conflict stems from structural realities rather than tactical errors. The Durand Line divides ethnic communities and economic lifelines that predate both modern states. Efforts to control the border militarily have deepened existing divisions instead of resolving them. Decades of securitisation have produced a frontier economy dependent on smuggling, taxation by armed groups, and informal trade networks that both states simultaneously condemn and rely upon.

For Pakistan, the dilemma is strategic because it cannot eliminate the TTP without Kabul’s cooperation, but coercive tactics make such cooperation politically impossible.  For Afghanistan, the challenge is political because the Taliban’s cohesion depends on alliances with militant factions, which discourages decisive action against the TTP. This mutual dependence on actors that undermine state authority ensures that both governments remain trapped in cycles of retaliation.

Regional dynamics further complicate this situation. The conflict intersects with broader rivalries involving China, India, and Gulf states. Pakistan continues to define its security posture through its rivalry with India, while Afghanistan’s outreach to New Delhi signals a shift in alliances. The ceasefire, viewed in this context, becomes an instrument of regional signalling rather than an isolated bilateral arrangement.

Economic Drivers of Conflict

Beneath the security crisis lies an economic dimension that perpetuates instability. Pakistan’s fiscal distress and energy shortages limit its ability to maintain a prolonged military presence in border regions. The Taliban government, cut off from formal aid and recognition, relies heavily on informal trade and taxation at border crossings. These networks provide both sides with revenue but also reinforce instability.

The TTP operates within this grey economy, collecting resources through extortion, taxation, and illicit trade. Its survival depends on porous borders that challenge both states’ authority. Successive governments in Islamabad and Kabul have tolerated such activities when politically convenient, creating a system in which militant networks are embedded within economic structures. The ceasefire cannot remove these incentives, it can only suspend direct confrontation while underlying drivers of violence persist.

The Future of the Ceasefire

An upcoming meeting in Istanbul is expected to outline monitoring procedures, but progress will remain limited unless both sides change how they define security. Pakistan and Afghanistan continue to approach the problem as one of territorial control rather than institutional cooperation. As long as each perceives the other as the main threat, the ceasefire will remain vulnerable to the next provocation.

The truce highlights the limits of short-term transactional diplomacy in asymmetric conflicts. Both countries attempt to manage instability through short-term arrangements rather than long-term institutional reform. The recurrence of violence despite repeated negotiations indicates that the border conflict has become a permanent feature of weak state capacity and competing narratives.

The agreement’s significance lies in what it reveals about the region’s political order. It exposes two governments that lack the institutional strength to enforce peace, whose legitimacy depends on projecting resilience, and whose militaries have become both agents and obstacles of stability. Unless both states redefine security through collective rather than coercive terms, the pattern of ceasefire and relapse will continue.

The Pakistan-Afghanistan truce is therefore an experiment in managing the crisis rather than resolving it. It signals recognition that neither state can afford sustained confrontation, but it also reflects their unwillingness to address the structural conditions that perpetuate conflict. The border may momentarily fall silent, yet the absence of violence should not be mistaken for the presence of peace.