China sent an envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan last week to mediate and call for an immediate ceasefire following border clashes that left several people dead, the Chinese Foreign Ministry announced yesterday, March 16.
Pakistan and Afghanistan have been in conflict for several months, with Islamabad accusing its neighbor of harboring fighters from the Pakistani Taliban (TTP), who have claimed responsibility for deadly attacks on Pakistani soil – a charge Kabul denies.
Pakistan is one of China’s closest partners in the region, but Beijing also presents itself as a “friendly neighbor” to Afghanistan.
“China has consistently served as a mediator in the conflict between Afghanistan and Pakistan through its own channels,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lin Jian stated yesterday at a press conference in Beijing.
Chinese diplomats said they had sent Yue Xiaoyong, the envoy for Afghan affairs, to both countries to help mediate the conflict. In a statement, the ministry indicated that the envoy visited Afghanistan and Pakistan between March 7 and 14.
In Afghanistan, Yue met with Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi and Minister of Commerce and Industry Nooruddin Azizi. He also held talks with senior Pakistani officials, including Foreign Secretary Amna Baloch, the ministry said, as reported by the France-Presse (AFP) news agency.
“He urged both sides to exercise calm and restraint, to implement an immediate ceasefire and cessation of hostilities, and to resolve their differences and disagreements through dialogue,” he noted.
Also read:Middle East: Chinese Ministry of Defense calls for an immediate end to military operations
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi also spoke by phone with Muttaqi last Friday and pledged to continue “actively working” to reconcile Afghanistan and Pakistan and ease tensions. “The use of force will only complicate the situation (…) and threaten regional peace and stability,” Wang told his Afghan counterpart, according to an account of the conversation.
In October 2025, fighting between Afghanistan and Pakistan left dozens dead and resulted in the near-total closure of the land border. After several rounds of mediation, the clashes subsided, but the conflict escalated again in late February following Pakistani airstrikes, followed by an Afghan ground offensive.
Both countries claimed responsibility for attacks over the weekend, with Afghanistan saying it had seized a border post in an operation that killed 14 Pakistani soldiers. Pakistan announced airstrikes in Kandahar, the city in southern Afghanistan where the Taliban’s supreme leader, Hibatullah Akhundzada, resides in isolation.
Also read:Pakistan enters an “open war” with Afghanistan and guarantees that it will “reduce to dust” any aggression from Kabul.
The United Nations (UN) announced last Friday that 75 Afghan civilians have been killed since fighting intensified in February. The conflict has displaced 115,000 people within Afghanistan, according to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).
The UN World Food Programme (WFP) announced on Sunday that it was providing emergency aid to 20,000 Afghan families displaced by the conflict.
Pakistan, which possesses nuclear weapons, and Afghanistan are neighbors of Iran, the target of a large-scale military offensive launched on February 28 by the United States and Israel, which sparked a new war in the Middle East.
