Fawad Chaudhry, Pakistan’s Federal Minister for Information and Broadcasting, said on Monday that Pakistan wants an all-inclusive government in Afghanistan and that the country believes that stability in Kabul can only be achieved by bringing all ethnic groups on board because the country is ethnically divided.
His remarks came during an interview with the BBC, in which he said that Prime Minister Imran Khan discussed an inclusive administration with former President Ashraf Ghani even before the current crisis in Kabul arose.
“Our emphasis was on the inclusive government. Unfortunately, if the elections would have been delayed as PM Imran khan suggested earlier and an inclusive government would have been placed, things might be different today,” said Fawad.
Because of the country’s ethnic variety, Fawad thinks that the best way to establish stability in Afghanistan is for all ethnic groups to be represented in the administration.
He also said that Pakistan is in contact with regional countries, as well as the US and the UK, to address the Afghan problem.
Speaking about Pakistan’s sacrifices rendered, Fawad said: “We have lost 80 thousand people and billions of dollars in the economy because of the Afghan war and the reason why Pakistan is conveniently blamed by others’ fault is that the powers who should have heeded to Pakistan’s advice earlier but Pak advise was overlooked and we have paid the price of this conflict.
He said that, in order to ensure the future of Afghanistan, Pakistan must collaborate with regional and international actors to form an inclusive administration.
“We don’t have controlled influence over Taliban but we can bring Taliban’s on the table of talks with the US,” he said adding that Pakistan is also capable of taking on the banned Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP).
“We had a problem with the previous Afghan government as at that time India was using the Afghan soil for funding TTP,” he said.
Pakistan appreciates the Taliban’s declaration that their territory would not be used against any country, according to the minister.
“They have shown the world that Afghanistan will not become the haven for international terrorist organizations. If instability continues in Afghanistan, then hundreds will migrate to Pakistan,” he told the publication. That’s one of the reasons we trying our best to avert any instability in Afghanistan.”
Read more: https://pakobserver.net/pakistan/
