Afghan President Hamid Karzai on Thursday termed Pakistan’s support critical to the success of the Afghan-led peace process, as he and Iranian President Mahmud Ahmedinejad arrived here to attend the trilateral summit meant for accelerating joint efforts to peace and stability in the war-torn Afghanistan.
During a one-on-one meeting with Karzai at the Aiwan-e-Sadr, President Asif Ali Zardari said regional cooperation was essential to addressing the challenges and exploiting opportunities in the region. Zardari expressed hope that the trilateral summit would be a significant step in promoting the agenda of regional peace, stability and prosperity.
Reiterating commitment to working together with President Karzai for enhancing bilateral interaction and evolving an institutional approach to deal with the common challenges facing the two countries, Zardari underlined the need for the two countries to stay together at this critical juncture and avoid being distracted by momentary events.
Discussing trade ties with Afghanistan, the president said connectivity through all available modes would help bolster mutual trade activities and promote people-to-people contacts.
Issues related to the Pak-Afghan Transit Trade Agreement (PATTA) also came under discussion. Both leaders agreed upon the need to resolve all the issues and remove bottlenecks if any, in the way of the PATTA.
President Zardari underlined the need for working together to extend the agreement to the Central Asian countries, which, he said was a doable project and would not only benefit the people of the region but also generate huge economic activity in Afghanistan. He said the two sides should accord priority to all the energy related projects to meet the growing energy needs and expedite process of development. The president also emphasised upon the early implementation of CASA-1000 project, TAPI and other infrastructure projects.
Briefing reporters, president’s spokesman Farhatullah Babar said during a one-on-one meeting followed by a delegation-level interaction, the two presidents discussed a range of issues including bilateral relations and the regional situation, Afghanistan issue, development projects in the region, PATTA, drug trafficking and border issues.
PM talks: Earlier, talks were held in cordial atmosphere between Pakistan and Afghanistan at the PM’s House, where Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani and the Afghan president led their delegations. Both the leaders had a one-on-one meeting prior to the bilateral talks.
Both sides agreed on the need to strengthen mutual cooperation to overcome the challenges of terrorism and extremism and expressed their resolve to work for the stability and peace of both the countries.
The prime minister said Pakistan supported any peace process in Afghanistan which was Afghan-led and Afghan-owned because peace, prosperity and independence of Afghanistan were in Pakistan’s best interest.
Both sides reviewed the current developments in and around the region relating to peace and stability.
