ISLAMABAD – Afghan Foreign Minister Zalmai Rassoul will arrive in Pakistan on January 25 to chalk out an agenda for the forthcoming US-Pak-Afghan trilateral meeting being held in Washington next month.
“The trilateral meeting in Washington will be attended by US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and her counterparts from Islamabad and Kabul. The Afghan foreign minister is coming to Pakistan to chalk out an agenda for that important meeting with his Pakistani counterpart Shah Mehmood Qureshi, with a focus on narrowing down the differences between Islamabad and Kabul vis-a-vis counter-terrorism strategy,” a senior Pakistani official said on Tuesday, wishing not to be named.
He said Pakistan wanted a meaningful dialogue between Kabul and the Taliban when it came to the reconciliation process in Afghanistan, but the US had so far not come up with any clear position on the vital issue, which Islamabad believed was crucial for the success of whole exercise of peace talks.
“The reconciliation process launched by the Karzai administration with the Taliban needs to be backed by the US. The Afghan government needs to make it clear to the US administration, as without it, any peace talks will be of no use, we believe,” he said.
He said the Afghan foreign minister would also likely repeat Kabul’s request for Pakistan’s help for the success of peace talks with the Taliban.
Rassoul’s visit takes place in the wake of Foreign Secretary Salman Bashir’s two-day visit to Kabul that ended on Monday, wherein he met President Hamid Karzai, the Afghan foreign minister, Professor Rabbani and other senior officials.
“All these interactions are aimed at ending the differences between Islamabad and Kabul over the counter-terrorism strategy. Pakistan believes meaningful talks should be held straightaway with the reconcilable elements in the cadres of the Taliban, while Kabul believes that the Taliban should lay down their arms first, a position also backed by Washington,” the official said.
“Our position is that the arms’-surrender by the Taliban, shunning of Al Qaeda and other tough demands in the beginning will not allow the peace talks to move ahead and there ought to be flexibility shown by all parties, not only by the militants, but also by Kabul and Washington,” he said.
The official added that the recent Pak-Afghan meetings held during Salman Bashir’s visit to Kabul had been “very positive” and he returned “very satisfied” from Afghanistan.
