Only Afghan-led talks acceptable, PM tells US

ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani reassured the US on Monday that Pakistan remained committed to peace and reconciliation in Afghanistan, but appeared little supportive of Washington’s direct contacts with Taliban, bypassing Islamabad.
“Pakistan sincerely desires peace and stability in the region to ensure development and prosperity,” he said in a statement which significantly emphasised that Islamabad only “supports Afghan-led reconciliation and peace process”.
Prime Minister Gilani also spoke to US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and discussed the political process in Afghanistan and strains in Pakistan-US ties.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai has already distanced himself from the talks the US is having with Taliban by insisting that the Americans, and not his government, were spearheading the dialogue.
The US has said that the three meetings held with a group of Taliban representatives led by Tayyab Agha, an aide to Mullah Omar, in Qatar and Germany were just preliminary contacts.
The UK also confirmed last week that it was talking to the Taliban for a political settlement of the conflict in Afghanistan.
Prime Minister Gilani stated Pakistan’s expectations about any political dialogue with Taliban.
“Efforts should be to create conducive environment for negotiations leading to a situation acceptable to Pakistan, Afghanistan and the US.”
Even as the prime minister’s office issued the statement in the context of a Pakistan-Afghanistan-US ‘core meeting’ to be held in Kabul on Tuesday, it was also meant to serve as the government’s rejoinder to comments made by US Special Envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan Marc Grossman in the Afghan capital earlier in the day.
Mr Grossman had, at a news conference, said that Pakistan “now has important choices to make” and prove that it wanted an end to the Afghan conflict by acting against militant sanctuaries on its soil.
The envoy’s comments reflected the widening gulf between Islamabad and Washington over the endgame in Afghanistan.
Officials from Pakistan and Afghanistan will also meet separately after the trilateral core group meeting to pursue their joint efforts for peace and reconciliation.