Pakistan warns of civil war in Afghanistan if reconciliation process fails
ISLAMABAD - With the United States
efforts afoot to end the stalemate in talks with the Taliban in Doha, Pakistan
on Tuesday cautioned against a prolonged civil war in Afghanistan if the Afghan
reconciliation process failed and peace and stability could not be brought back
to the war-torn neighbouring state through dialogue and negotiations.
The deadlock in talks between the US and the
Taliban over the latter’s office in Doha, according to Pakistani officials was
unfortunate and they feel that a meaningful dialogue between all the
stakeholders in Afghanistan must begin to resolve the Afghanistan issue. On
condition of anonymity, a senior Pakistani official said they felt the Qatari
authorities had mishandled the issue of the ‘Taliban Office’ in Doha.
“The talks between Taliban and US officials
could have been held at some different venue as well,” he said. The official
also expressed concerns over the role of Afghan President Hamid Karzai in the
Afghanistan reconciliation process and said he should play a constructive role
in this regard.
He, however, hoped that the Doha talks would
soon resume and the current impasse would prove to be a temporary one. He said
the Taliban had been accepted as one of the stakeholders in Afghanistan as a
result of the Doha process.
“The United States, the Afghan government, the
Taliban and Northern Alliance are stakeholders in Afghanistan and there must be
a dialogue between them,” he said. “The resumption of the Doha process is vital
for the peace and security of Afghanistan,” he said, adding that if the
reconciliation process failed to deliver, Afghanistan could plunge into a
prolonged civil war.
Asked about Pakistan’s contingency plan for
its own security in case of any civil war erupting in Afghanistan, the official
said Pakistan would take all possible measures for its border security and to
avert any spill over effect of the war and strife in Afghanistan on Pakistani
regions.
He said Pakistan would continue to support the
peace process in Afghanistan and it would not engage in blame games with the
neighboring state despite the harsh and negative statements being directed
towards Islamabad from across the western border.
On relations with the US, the official said
Pakistan wanted to move beyond Afghanistan in its relations with Washington,
adding that the strategic dialogue between Islamabad and Washington that
encompassed talks on cooperation in different sectors must be restored.
On Indo-Pak ties and the ongoing fresh efforts
by both sides for the resumption of the peace dialogue, the official said the
Indo-Pak ties had a good start but it was accident prone. He said Prime
Minister Nawaz Sharif could have a meeting with his Indian counterpart in
September this year in New York on the sidelines of the United Nations General
Assembly’s meeting but before that both sides were required to have fruitful
engagements at the officials and ministers’ level.
Another
senior Pakistani official, who also sought anonymity, said the prime minister’s
visit to China was very successful and it was evident from various agreements
and MoUs signed during his trip to the friendly neighboring state.
“The agreements signed in China will bring
investment of billions of dollars to Pakistan and will help revive the
struggling economy,” he said. To a question on any agreement on the
understanding reached at on the construction of more nuclear power plants in
Pakistan by China, he said the cooperation in field of civilian nuclear
technology between Islamabad and Beijing and China was an ongoing cooperation and
it started before China became the member of Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG), a
global body that regulated the issues related to nuclear proliferation and
commerce.
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