Minister for Information and Broadcasting Fawad Chaudhry on Monday urged the newly appointed interior minister in Afghanistan to avoid trivialising the threat posed by the Islamic State (IS) militant outfit.
“Trivialising the threat of ISIS is to live in cuckooland, the new Afghan interior minister needs a reality check. Decide if you want Pakistan as a partner or as a scapegoat for your own govt’s failures. Mr. Minister! Time to get real and give up phantom thoughts from a paranoid mind,” he tweeted.
Trivializing the threat of ISIS is to live in cukoland,the new Afghan interior minister needs a reality check.Decide if you want Pakistan as a partner or as a scapegoat for your own govt’s failures. Mr. Minister!Time to get real and give up phantom thoughts from a paranoid mind
— Ch Fawad Hussain (@fawadchaudhry) December 24, 2018
Afghan President Ashraf Ghani on Sunday replaced two of the country’s top security chiefs with staunch anti-Taliban officials, in a major shake-up days after US President Donald Trump’s decision to slash troop numbers in the country.
Amrullah Saleh and Assadullah Khaled, both former heads of the Afghan intelligence agency, have been appointed to the critical posts of interior minister and defence minister, respectively, a presidential decree said.
Both Saleh and Khaled are critical of Pakistan as well.
The fresh appointments come at a time when the US is cutting troop numbers in the country and is holding talks with the Afghan Taliban.
On Monday, Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi met his Afghani counterpart Salahuddin Rabbani in Kabul where both held delegation-level talks.
According to a Foreign Office press release, the representatives discussed issues of mutual interest, progress on Afghan peace and reconciliation process and economic and trade issues.
During the visits, the foreign minister will discuss Pakistan’s bilateral relations with the senior leadership of these countries, to strengthen cooperation in various areas.
“Implementing the vision of Prime Minister Imran Khan, Pakistan is eager to strengthen ties with neighbours and regional partners. Such cooperation is the key to unleashing Pakistan’s considerable potential and expanding mutually beneficial economic cooperation and development,” the official statement issued on Monday said.
“Pakistan has always maintained that the solution to the conflict in Afghanistan lies in an Afghan-led and Afghan-owned peace process. International community’s recent consensus to adopt this as the guiding principle to resolve the 40-years old Afghan conflict, vindicates Pakistan’s long-held view,” the press release added.
