Afghanistan Times
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AT Monitoring Desk-KABUL: Pakistan Prime Minister, Nawaz Sharif, who is currently on a visit to Sri Lanka renewed his country’s consistent support for the quadrilateral meeting, focusing to resume comprehensive peace talks between Kabul and the Taliban.
Representative from Afghanistan, Pakistan, the United States and China may soon gather under one roof to talk on methods how to resume the peace talks between Afghan government and the Taliban.
He said that Pakistan believes that peaceful Afghanistan was in its interest and termed terrorism a common enemy of both countries. He furthered that Pakistan had been consistently supporting an Afghan-led and Afghan-owned reconciliation process. He also assured his country’s readiness to continue support for resumption of the peace dialogue between the Afghan government and the Taliban.
Talking at the Lakshman Kadirgamar Institute of International Relations and Strategic Studies in Colombo, Nawaz said that radicalization and global terrorism could not be eliminated until its root cause was addressed. He furthered that Pakistan was waging a decisive battle against terrorism.
Pakistani primer said that he was also deeply touched by Modi’s decision to fly to Lahore last month on his way back from Afghanistan. He also said that foreign secretaries of the two countries would meet in Islamabad soon.
Last month President Ashraf Ghani said that peace talks between the Afghan government and the Taliban would start within a few weeks.
He said that Pakistan has vowed to facilitate the peace parleys.
Showing meticulous optimism about results of the upcoming peace parleys, President Ghani said that the pace talks will be held within the framework of the Constitution.
Ghani said that Pakistan during trilateral and quadrilateral meetings ensured to cooperate with Afghanistan in brining everlasting peace to country.
He added that the peace talks would start within few weeks and the peace would be talked only with those willing to come to the negotiation table. “Those who want to talk peace are most welcome, but those who don’t want peace and want to continue fighting for others interest in Afghanistan will face legitimate force. By legitimate use of force we don’t mean that Afghanistan and its people must use it all alone, but the countries from the region, particularly Pakistan, must also extend the use of legitimate force,” Ghani said.
The president said that Pakistan has agreed to take action against those militant groups on its soil, who are not willing to talk peace with Afghanistan.
Afghans say that they are expecting tangible results and the quadrilateral meeting should not be dominated by symbolic gestures.
It is worth mentioning that the direct peace talks between the Afghan government and the Taliban started in Murree, a resort city near Islamabad, in June, 2015. However, the peace talks faced a deadlock after revelation of the death of the Taliban’s supreme leader Mullah Omar.
