Pakistan, S. Arabia to work for peace in Afghanistan

The Nation, Jan 12, 1998

RIYADH (PPI)-Pakistan and Saudi Arabia have agreed to work closely to encourage a negotiated settlement in Afghanistan and will continue to cooperate with the UN and OIC for facilitating early restoration of durable peace in that country.

The Foreign Minister of Saudi Arabia Prince Saud Al-Faisal who met Foreign Secretary Shamshad Ahmed Khan here Sunday discussed developments concerning Afghanistan. Prince Saud was given a detailed briefing on the initiative of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to promote peace process in Afghanistan. Iftikhar Murshid, Additional Secretary, Afghanistan Desk, who recently returned from Tehran after talks with Iranian leaders on developments in Afghanistan and Pakistan Ambassador Khalid Mahmood were also present during the meeting. Earlier on Saturday Shamshad Ahmed had called on Acting President of Afghanistan Mulla Rabbani and stressed the need for urgent restoration of peace in Afghanistan and negotiations with other Afghan parties.

Prince Saud Al-Faisal conveyed to the Foreign Secretary his deep appreciation for the efforts of Nawaz Sharif and reiterated his government's full support for these initiatives, Saudi Foreign Minister expressed the hope that all Afghan parties would respond quickly and positively to current initiative of Nawaz Sharif for an intra-Afghan dialogue. He positively viewed proposal of Taliban government for a meeting of the ulema to discuss and settle issue of Afghanistan. Saudi Arabia was ready to extend full cooperation to facilitate this process.

The Foreign Secretary also briefed Prince Saud on the deteriorating situation in Kashmir as a consequence of continued Indian repression of the Kashmiri people and acts of sacrilege against Muslim shrines in the Occupied territory.

Prince Saud was apprised of the current stalemate in Pakistan-India dialogue following backtracking by New Delhi on its commitments to the agreed mechanism of a working group on Kashmir.

Unfortunately, India had yet to reciprocate sincerity of purpose of Pakistan and was instead vitiating the atmosphere through continued repression in Kashmir and repeated Line of Control violations.

Meanwhile, acting President of Afghanistan Mulla Rabbani during his meeting with Foreign Secretary, Shamshad Ahmed here lauded efforts of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to promote peace process in Afghanistan and assured Taliban will participate in the meeting of ulema with sincerity of purpose. It could get underway as soon as a list of participants is received from Northern Alliance.

Acting Afghan President currently here in connection with Ramazan observed that there was an unwarranted international bias against Taliban and an utter lack of understathere was an unwarranted

He emphasised that Taliban movement had come into existence for the very purpose of restoring peace in the country. He stressed that economic recovery was high on the Taliban agenda.