ISLAMABAD: Pakistan on Thursday hailed US representatives’ forthcoming meeting with the Taliban officers as a “ welcome development” that would help address challenges faced by the war-torn country.
At the daily media briefing, Foreign Office spokesperson Asim Iftikhar said “ It would be a welcome development.”
Recalling Pakistan’s harmonious advocacy for the world’s engagement with the Taliban, who took control of Afghanistan in August after the fall of the Ghani government, Mr Iftikhar said “ We’ve been saying, encouraging and championing enhanced engagement of the transnational community with Afghanistan to help address its challenges.”
The US and Taliban officers are meeting in Doha this coming week.
US Special Representative for Afghanistan Tom West and Taliban Foreign Minister Mullah Amir Khan Muttaqi will lead their separate sides at the addresses that would continue for two days. It would be the alternate meeting between the two sides since the completion of the chaotic US pullout from Afghanistan. The two sides last met in Doha in October.
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A spokesperson for the Taliban foreign ministry Abdul Qahar Balkhi, according to Afghan media, said that Muttaqi’s delegation for the addresses would include representatives of the education, health, finance, security, and banking sectors of Afghanistan.
Mr. West had, along with special representatives of China, Russia, and Pakistan met Muttaqi and other Taliban officers on the sidelines of an extended troika meeting in Islamabad on Nov 11.
Balkhi said that Taliban officers would bandy political matters, firmed foreign reserves, philanthropic backing, education, health, and security of delegacies in Kabul in their engagements in Doha. FO Spokesman Iftikhar emphasized the need for unfreezing of Afghan reserves by the US. “ Pakistan and other countries have been saying that it needs to be considered as a way of supporting the Afghan people who are faced with immense challenges. That remains our anticipation,” he said.
The profitable extremity caused by Western warrants on Taliban governance and freezing of Afghan means has exacerbated the philanthropic and fiscal extremity in Afghanistan.
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