Islamabad: Amid fears of a civil war as US and coalition forces begin their full pullout from a 20-year war in Afghanistan, President Ashraf Ghani has said the “question of peace or hostility in the country is now in Pakistani hands”. He emphasised the need for a regional peace initiative and a bigger role by Europe to “get Islamabad on board”. “It is first and foremost a matter of getting Pakistan on board,” Ghani said in an interview with Germany’s Der Spiegel. “The US now plays only a minor role.”
About Pakistan’s influence on the Taliban, the Afghan president said the neighbouring country operates an organised system of support. “The Taliban receives logistics in Pakistan, their finances are there and recruitment is there,” he said. “The names of the various decision-making bodies of the Taliban are Quetta Shura, Miramshah Shura and Peshawar Shura (named after the Pakistani cities where they are located). There is a deep relationship with the state.” According to Ghani, the European countries, especially Germany, “can do a lot” in the peace process with the Taliban. “Clear messages and incentives from Germany will help – and, conversely, they should introduce sanctions if the decision goes in a different direction than hoped,” he said.
Ghani described a future security agreement between Afghanistan and Pakistan as the key to peace. He hastened to add that his goal was the neutrality of Afghanistan. “We don’t want a new protecting power, and we don’t want to be part of regional or international rivalries.” Ghani said that peace would primarily be decided upon regionally and that “we are at a crucial moment of rethinking”.
Ghani’s remarks came a day after he met the Pakistani army chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa in Kabul. He said Bajwa assured him “that the restoration of the Emirate or dictatorship by the Taliban was not in anybody’s interest in the region, especially Pakistan”.
China slams ‘hasty’ withdrawal of US troops
China has said that the “hasty” withdrawal of the US troops from Afghanistan has severely affected the peace process and the regional stability as it called on the UN to play its “due role” and urged the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, of which India and Pakistan are members, to pay more attention to the situation. The issue of US withdrawal from Afghanistan figured in the telephonic conversation between Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi and his Pakistan counterpart Shah Mehmood Qureshi. Wang said that the “hasty withdrawal of the US troops from Afghanistan”, which is expected to be completed by September this year, has severely impacted the Afghan domestic peace process and negatively affected the regional stability.
