Pakistan to “carefully examine” Bonn Declaration: Khar

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Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar assured her German counterpart that “Pakistan would carefully examine the Bonn declaration,” the Foreign Ministry said on Tuesday.
German Foreign Minister Dr Guido Westerwelle called Khar to take Pakistan into confidence on the outcome of the Bonn Conference on Afghanistan, a Foreign Ministry statement said.
Pakistan boycotted the conference in protest against the Nov.26 NATO raids on two of its border posts that killed 24 soldiers and injured 13 others.
World leaders had urged Pakistan to reconsider its boycott decision but Islamabad stayed away from the assembly held on Monday.
The German Foreign Minister expressed the hope that Pakistan would continue extending its valuable support to peace and development in Afghanistan, especially towards achieving political reconciliation in the country, the foreign ministry statement said.
Thanking her German counterpart for taking Pakistan into confidence, Khar stressed that stability in Afghanistan was essential for peace in the region.
“It was therefore necessary that all worked together on the basis of mutual respect to attain the shared objective,” she said.
She added that Pakistan was resolved to continue striving for peace and prosperity in the region, and acknowledged Germany’s valuable contributions in bringing about peace in Afghanistan.
The Bonn Declaration said that al-Qaida has been disrupted and Afghanistan’s national security institutions are increasingly able to assume responsibility for a secure and independent Afghanistan. However, it added that shortcomings must be addressed with the goal of creating a peaceful Afghanistan in which international terrorism does not again find sanctuary and that can assume its rightful place among sovereign nations.
The declaration concluded by saying that as foreign forces leave Afghanistan a “decade of transformation” should begin “in which Afghanistan consolidates its sovereignty.”