Pakistan’s Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi has said power sharing is the way to avert civil war in Afghanistan.
Speaking at the Senate’s Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs in Islamabad on Friday, he said it is our effort and desire that the neighboring country does not plunge into the civil war again.
Shah Mahmood Qureshi said Pakistan wants that the dignified return of Afghan refugees be made part of the Afghan peace process.
The Foreign Minister said Iran has an important role regarding Afghanistan which cannot be overlooked.
He said Pakistan’s relations with Iran has further strengthened. He said we are establishing border markets with Iran.
“Pakistan wants the dignified return of Afghan refugees to be made part of the Afghan peace process,” FM Qureshi said. “Iran has an important role regarding Afghanistan which cannot be overlooked.”
Earlier in June, the foreign minister said that the US should withdraw systematically from Afghanistan to prevent what happened there in the 1990s from recurring, in the wake of Soviet forces’ withdrawal.
“If [the US] withdrawal is not systematic, we are concerned that Afghanistan may get sucked into the situation that we experienced in the 1990s, when there was anarchy, civil war, instability,” Qureshi told Anadolu Agency at the Antalya Diplomacy Forum in the Turkish Riviera city of Antalya.
Qureshi said that the withdrawal – currently set to be finished by this September 11 – should be carried out in a “responsible way.”
“Afghans have paid the biggest price. Second to the Afghans are the Pakistanis. We lost 83,000 lives on account of terrorism. Our economy has suffered close to over $128 billion,” he said.
