Although Pakistan’s National Action Plan calls to “ensure that no armed militias are allowed to function in the country,” several terrorist groups that focus on attacks outside the country continued to operate from Pakistani soil in 2018, including the Haqqani Network, Lashkar-e-Tayyiba, and Jaish-e-Mohammad. The government and military acted inconsistently with respect to terrorist safe havens throughout the country. Authorities did not take sufficient action to stop certain terrorist groups and individuals from openly operating in the country.

Pakistan is committed to combating the trafficking of items that could contribute to the development of WMDs and their delivery systems. Pakistan was a constructive and active participant in International Atomic Energy Agency-hosted meetings and in the Global Initiative to Combat Nuclear Terrorism. The Department of State’s Export Control and Related Border Security (EXBS) program increased the Government of Pakistan’s enforcement capacity by sponsoring training for Pakistani Customs and the Strategic Export Control Division officials on how to properly identify strategic commodities of concern. These commodity identification and advanced interdiction trainings were implemented by the Department of Energy and the Department of Homeland Security.

EXBS also sponsored regional collaboration through nonproliferation fellowships and cross-border coordination with Pakistan and Afghanistan through the UNODC-World Customs Organization’s Container Control Programme (CCP). Under the CCP, training was provided to enhance the targeting skills of port control unit officials at the Jalalabad bordercrossing and encouraged sharing of customs data between countries.