India–Afghanistan

Absence of land access, not distance, is the binding constraint on Indian policy toward Afghanistan: India's only boundary with it lies across territory under Pakistani control. Afghanistan is a SAARC member, and the Strategic Partnership Agreement, 2011 was Afghanistan's first such agreement with any country. Development assistance has been the main instrument, the Zaranj–Delaram highway, the parliament building completed in 2015, and the Afghan–India Friendship Dam in Herat province inaugurated in 2016. Access runs instead through Iran's Chabahar port and the International North-South Transport Corridor.