Britain urged Pakistan on Thursday to play a constructive role for the success of reconciliatory efforts in Afghanistan as it admitted that it too was involved in peace talks with the Taliban. Britain’s admission of having contacts with the Taliban for the restoration of peace in Afghanistan has coincided with the troop drawdown announcement by US President Barack Obama, who said the country would withdraw 33,000 troops from Afghanistan by summer next year.
Before that the US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates too had revealed that the US was in negotiations with the Taliban to end the Afghan war. British Foreign Secretary William Hague told a joint news conference here with Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Hina Rabbani Khar after their meeting that his country was involved in talks with the Taliban. “Contacts do take place but this is an Afghan-led process and Britain will assist and facilitate,” he said. “Britain is connected to those events but I don’t want to say any more than that. Any such contacts in any case are at a very preliminary stage,” he said.
Welcoming the Afghanistan drawdown plan of President Obama, Hague said that Britain too would remove all its combat troops from Afghanistan by 2015. Britain has around 9,500 troops in Afghanistan, making it the second-largest contributor of troops to the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) forces in Afghanistan after the US. However, he said sustained pressure would be applied to Afghan insurgents despite a troop cutback. He said that even after the American withdrawals, there would still be approximately 100,000 international troops based in Afghanistan.
He urged Pakistan to play a constructive role in reconciliation efforts in Afghanistan and welcomed what he said were improved relations between the two neighbours, whose relations had traditionally been shrouded in mutual distrust. Hague said Pakistan and the UK had an unbreakable partnership and shared determination to defeat terrorism and violent extremism.
He said the enemy of Pakistan was the enemy of Britain. “It is in the interest of both countries to sustain the strategic relationship based on mutual respect and mutual trust and benefit,” he added. He said his country was Pakistan’s greatest advocate for market access to the European Union, which could dramatically increase Pakistan’s exports. Earlier, at the talks, the two sides agreed to prepare a comprehensive plan of action to intensify cooperation in trade and business, defence, development, education, health, security and cultural cooperation, according to an official statement.
