ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s special representative to Afghanistan, Ambassadors Asif Durrani, has taken up all issues of mutual concern, including militant threat and attacks in Pakistan, with the Afghan Taliban authorities, Pakistan’s Foreign Office said on Friday, amid a visit by the Pakistani envoy to Kabul.
Durrani arrived in Kabul on a three-day visit on July 19, his first official visit to Afghanistan since assuming responsibilities as Pakistan’s special representative to the neighboring country.
Durrani met with Afghanistan’s Acting Prime Minister Mawlawi Abdul Kabir, Acting Minister for Foreign Affairs Mawlawi Amir Khan Muttaqi, Acting Minister for Commerce Nooruddin Azizi and other high-ranking Taliban officials, according to the Pakistani foreign office.
“We have discussed all issues of our concern, including the terrorist threat and terrorist acts, that take place in Pakistan,” Foreign Office spokesperson Mumtaz Zahra Baloch told reporters at a press briefing on Friday.
“Pakistan has raised this issue with the Afghan authorities at every important engagement that takes place between Pakistani and Afghan authorities.”
Pakistan's special envoy for Afghanistan Asif Durrani (left) calls on Afghan Foreign Minister Mawlawi Amir Khan Muttaqi in Kabul, Afghanistan, on July 19, 2023. (@QaharBalkhi/Twitter)
Pakistan raised the issue and discussed the threats that had been made from the Afghani soil, according to Baloch.
Durrani reaffirmed Pakistan’s firm commitment to work closely with Afghanistan in promoting the mutually reinforcing goals of regional peace and security.
“I assure you that all issues of our concern and all aspects of mutual cooperation are on the agenda of this visit,” she said, adding militancy was a matter of “serious concern” for Pakistan.
Afghanistan had given the commitment, including in the trilateral agreement between Pakistan, Afghanistan and China, that it would not allow any individual or group, including the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), to pose a threat to other’s security, Baloch said.
“We hope that Afghanistan will adhere to the commitments it has made to Pakistan and to the international community and ensure that its soil on not used for terrorism,” she added.
The visit by the Pakistani special representative comes at a time of a renewed wave of militant attacks in Pakistan’s northwestern and southwestern regions that border Afghanistan.
On Thursday, at least four people were killed and 10 were injured in the northwestern Pakistani district of Khyber after two suicide bombers attacked a compound that housed a police station and several government offices, the police said.
The attacks have increased particularly after the TTP, or the Pakistani Taliban, called off a fragile, months-long truce with the central government in Islamabad in November last year. The militant group, which is said to have sanctuaries in neighboring Afghanistan, is separate from but a close ally of the Afghan Taliban.
Islamabad says it has time and again raised the matter of TTP with the Afghan Taliban authorities, but there has been a lukewarm response from Kabul.
