Says Taliban govt heading towards inclusivity
NewYork
Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi has said Pakistan wants a strong relationship with the US beyond counter-terrorism and Afghanistan after the withdrawal of US troops from the war-torn country.
The foreign minister was addressing a session of the Council on Foreign Relations in New York and stated that both the countries have mutual areas of interest to build a more substantive and broad-based relationship.
“Pakistan wants to leverage its connectivity infrastructure including the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor to enhance regional trade and economic integration,” Qureshi said.
He maintained that the US will be an important partner in this regard. “Pakistan’s climate-friendly energy policy offers tremendous opportunities for US companies specialised in clean and renewable energy,” the minister stated and added that Pakistan
sits at the crossroads of South and Central Asia and is a market of over 220 million people.
According to Qureshi, Pakistan and the US came together to decimate al Qaida’s core leadership and infrastructure.
“Pakistan has shifted its focus from geo-politics to geo-economics and can work with the US from development finance cooperation to general economic activity on the Pakistan and Afghanistan border which will help the Afghans,” he said.
Qureshi appreciated the Afghan Taliban for
including various representatives of ethnicities in Afghanistan, calling on the world to not abandon the country at this critical juncture.
“As per my information, the government in Afghanistan is expanding and other ethnicities are also being included
in it,” said the foreign minister while virtually addressing the Foreign Press Association on the occasion of the 76th session of the United Nations General Assembly.
“If this report is true then they are moving towards collectivism and inclusivity, which is the right direction. The international community is talking about a comprehensive political settlement in Afghanistan.
The international community wants to make sure that terrorist groups have no place in Afghanistan.
At the same time, the Taliban have also announced that they will not allow the Afghan territory to be used against any country. We expect the Taliban
to live up to their promises responsibly.”
Addressing the Pakistani community in New York, Shah Mahmood Qureshi said that there was no security threat to the New Zealand cricket team in Pakistan.
Qureshi said that the New Zealand authorities were even offered to commute through helicopter in Pakistan but the New Zealand cricket board refused to accept any offer.
“It is possible that a neighboring country has created this drama to harm Pakistan,” stated the foreign minister.
