Pakistan made sincere efforts for peace in Afghanistan: FO Zakaria

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan has made sincere efforts for peace in Afghanistan, said Foreign Office Spokesperson Nafees Zakaria in a weekly briefing on Friday, while responding to US President Donald Trump’s criticism on Pakistan for “housing the very terrorist Americans are fighting in the war-torn country.”

Zakaria said Pakistan’s position on the neighboring country is clear: “It has sincerely striven for peaceful Afghanistan.”

The international community, including America, had become aware of Pakistan’s response to the American president’s accusations, he added.

“No country in the world has rendered sacrifices more than Pakistan in the fight against terrorism,” he said and reiterated Pakistan will continue to make efforts for bringing peace to the region.

Slamming Trump’s request to India to play a greater role in stabilizing and developing Afghanistan, Zakaria said the country involved in state-sponsored terrorism cannot bring peace and stability in the region.

In India, Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and other extremist outfits influencing the verdicts of courts, he said while expressing concern over the release of the culprits involved in Smjhota Express attack.

A day before, the meeting of National Security Committee was held in Islamabad with Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi in chair to discuss the Trump Administration’s South Asia Strategy.

The committee observed that to scapegoat Pakistan will not help in stabilizing Afghanistan. In fact, being its immediate neighbor, Pakistan has an abiding interest in peace and stability in Afghanistan.

“Pakistan had to manage the blowback of a protracted conflict in Afghanistan that resulted in deluge of refugees, flow of drugs and arms and more recently in the shape of terrorist safe havens in eastern Afghanistan from where anti-Pakistan terrorist groups continue to operate and launch attacks inside Pakistan,” the committee observed.

The fact remains that the complex issues and internal dynamics inside Afghanistan pose a grave challenge not only to Pakistan but to the broader region and the international community.

While noting the US commitment to continue to shoulder the burden of Afghanistan and reverse the expanding ungoverned spaces in the country, the National Security Committee observed that Pakistan has consistently supported all international efforts for a stable and peaceful Afghanistan and has also committed more than a billion US dollars for infrastructure and social development in that country.