The request, sent by Junaid Mahmood, Secretary (T&B), to the Director General of the Directorate General of Transit Trade in Karachi, seeks to allow cargo to move through the Taftan-Gabd crossing after the WeBOC Customs clearance system failed to process the shipments.
The letter, dated May 13, 2026, references correspondence from the Directorate of Transit Trade and states that the contents “have been examined.” It directs the Karachi office to review provisions of the Customs Rules, 2001—specifically Rules 974 and 975—and suggests that if the matter remains unresolved after review, “mandatory approval from the Board is required” under the powers granted by the Custom Act, 1969.
The WeBOC system, Pakistan’s indigenously developed web-based customs clearance platform, handles over 45% of the Federal Board of Revenue’s annual revenue and processes imports, exports, and transit trade in a paperless environment. However, the absence of the Taftan-Gabd Centralized Regulatory Framework module has created a bottleneck for transit cargo.
The manual override request comes as Pakistan shifts transit routes away from Afghanistan following border closures at Torkham and Chaman in October 2025 due to security risks and cross-border militancy. More than 5,500 Afghan transit containers remain stranded, and 600 vehicles have been stuck at various locations, with stakeholders warning of millions in daily losses.
Pakistan has been actively recalibrating its trade map, expanding connectivity with Central Asian nations through alternative corridors. In April 2026, Pakistan Customs launched the first export consignment from the Karachi Export Processing Zone to Kyrgyzstan via the Sost Dry Port in China under the TIR regime, and operationalized a new trade route to Central Asia via Iran.
The letter also directs the Directorate to take up the matter with the Directorate of Reforms & Automation in Karachi for “immediate deployment of relevant CRF” to streamline transit trade flow and prevent recurrence of similar issues.
The manual intervention request will now be reviewed by customs authorities, with the possibility of escalation to the Federal Board of Revenue for formal approval.