PM Imran Khan: “Pakistan useful for US only to clean up Afghanistan ‘mess’”

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Pakistan’s PM Imran Khan warns of ‘civil war’ in Afghanistan

Aug 12, 2021: Pakistani PM Imran Khan has accused the United States of seeing his country as useful only in the context of the “mess” it is leaving behind in Afghanistan after 20 years of fighting.

Washington is pressuring Pakistan to use its influence with the Taliban to reach a peace deal because talks between the Taliban and the Afghan government have stalled and violence in Afghanistan has escalated.

“Pakistan is just considered only to be useful in the context of somehow settling this mess which has been left behind after 20 years of trying to find a military solution when there was not one,” Khan told foreign journalists at his home in Islamabad on Wednesday.

The United States will withdraw its troops by August 31, 20 years after the overthrow of the Taliban government in 2001. Kabul and several Western governments assert that Pakistan’s support for the Taliban has given it a chance to fight.

Allegations of supporting the Taliban despite being US allies have long been a bitter issue between Washington and Islamabad.

Pakistan refuses to support the Taliban and says it has no plans for picking sides. Khan said Islamabad was not becoming a party in Afghanistan. “I think the Americans have decided that India is their strategic partner, and I think that’s why Pakistan is treated differently now,” PM Imran Khan said.

Pakistan and India are rivals and have fought three wars. The two have strong ties and currently have minimal diplomatic ties. PM Imran Khan added that in the current situation, a political settlement in Afghanistan looks difficult.

He said he tried to persuade Taliban leaders when they reached a settlement on a visit to Pakistan.

“The condition is that as long as Ashraf Ghani is there, we (Taliban) are not going to talk to the Afghan government,” Khan said, quoting the Taliban leaders as telling him.

Also on Wednesday, the Pakistani military said in a statement that all stakeholders should “play a positive role for lasting peace” in Afghanistan, calling it a “collective responsibility”.

Earlier Army Chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa said that misunderstandings and sacrifice should be avoided.

Peace talks between the Taliban, which Ghani and his government consider an American puppet, and a team of Afghan negotiators nominated by Kabul, began last September, but no significant progress has been made.

Representatives from several countries, including the United States, are currently in the Qatari capital, Doha, to discuss a final ceasefire with both sides.

US forces have continued airstrikes to support Afghan forces against the Taliban’s advance, but it is unclear whether such assistance will continue after August 31.

PM Imran Khan said Pakistan had made it “very clear” that it did not want a US military base in Pakistan after the withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan.

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