ISLAMABAD: Pakistan and Taliban on Thursday called for early resumption of Afghan peace talks as Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi laid emphasis on reduction of hostilities by all parties to the conflict.

The call was made during a meeting between Foreign Minister Qureshi and the visiting delegation of Doha-based Taliban Political Commission (TPC), led by its head Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar.

A statement issued after the meeting said: “Both sides agreed on the need for earliest resumption of the peace process.”

The TPC delegation is visiting Islamabad on an invitation of the Pakistan government for a discussion on the prospects of resumption of stalled peace talks between the United States and Taliban. Simultaneously, US Special Envoy for Afghan Reconciliation Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad is also here.

Pakistan has been pushing for the resumption of the engagement between the US and Taliban that went off the rails after President Donald Trump’s Sept 7, tweet through which he had ended talks with the insurgent group and announced cancellation of a planned meeting with Taliban leaders and Afghan President Ashraf Ghani at Camp David because of death of a US soldier in an attack in Kabul. The US and Taliban were at that stage closest to signing a deal for ending the conflict that is now in its second decade.

Foreign Minister Qureshi meets Taliban delegation, lays emphasis on reduction of hostilities by all parties to the conflict

Prime Minister Imran Khan, later in his meetings with President Trump and Ambassador Khalilzad on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly session, had tried to persuade them to return to the talks so that the progress made towards peace was not lost.

Taliban are enthusiastic about the resumption of talks. The ball is, however, in the US’s court now, which is interested in re-engaging, but not exactly too keen and is instead linking the revival of the engagement to participation of the Afghan government in the process and announcement of a ceasefire in the war-torn country.

Speaking to the Taliban delegation, Foreign Minister Qureshi stressed that reduction of violence by all parties to the conflict was necessary to provide an enabling environment for resumption of the peace process at an early date.

He reaffirmed Pakistan’s continued support for peace in Afghanistan and said his country firmly believed that there was no military solution to the Afghan dispute and the way forward lay in an inclusive peace and reconciliation process, involving all sections of Afghan society.

Mr Qureshi maintained that the draft peace agreement reached between the US and Taliban after nine rounds of talks in Doha had “laid a firm ground for achieving a sustainable peace deal in Afghanistan”.

Lauding Taliban for their “serious engagement” with the peace process, the foreign minister emphasised taking it to the logical conclusion. He recalled the existing broad regional and international consensus for peace in Afghanistan and said that it provided the best opportunity for ending the conflict. This opportunity, he underscored, “must not be lost”.

Spokesman for Taliban’s political office Suhail Shaheen said in a tweet that besides peace, issues related to ties between Pakistan and Afghanistan and political matters were also discussed during meetings with Foreign Minister Qureshi and other Pakistani officials.

He said the Taliban delegation asked for transportation, health and education facilities for Afghan refugees living in Pakistan and facilitation for Afghan businessmen and payment of visa fees. He said Mr Qureshi offered “full cooperation” on these issues.

There were rumours that the Taliban delegation also met Prime Minister Khan, but a press officer at the Prime Minister Office denied that any such meeting took place on Thursday.

FO briefing

Foreign Office spokesman Dr Mohammad Faisal, while speaking at a weekly media briefing, parried several questions from media persons, asking them to use the statement on Taliban delegation’s visit to the Foreign Office. “I would not like to comment on those questions which have not been catered for in the press release, as this is a highly sensitive and delicate process that is being handled in a careful manner,” he said.

Foreign Minister Qureshi, while talking to reporters in Multan later, sounded optimistic about a meeting between delegations of the US and Taliban to end the impasse in their talks.

However, Voice of America reported that President Trump was non-committal. “We have a real problem,” Mr Trump said on Thursday morning in response to a VoA’s question whether he would revive talks with the Taliban. “We’ve been hitting the Taliban very, very hard. And as far as I’m concerned, they still haven’t recovered from killing 12 people, one of them happens to be a great American soldier from Puerto Rico. They still have not recovered, and they probably never will,” he added.

Published in Dawn, October 4th, 2019