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Pakistan rejects Afghan-US split report

IRNA - Islamic Republic News Agency

Islamabad, April 28, IRNA -- Pakistan Wednesday rejected as 'baseless assertions' in Wall Street Journal report that it is ‘lobbying Afghanistan's president against building a long-term strategic partnership with US.'

The WSJ also reported that Pakistan urged the Afghan President to look to Pakistan — and its Chinese ally — for help in striking a peace deal with the Taliban and rebuilding the economy.

The WSJ quoted Afghan officials to have provided information to the daily but Afghan Presidential spokesman Waheed Omar also rejected the reports at a news conference in Kabul on Tuesday.

The Afghan spokesman said that Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani had not floated any proposal during his talks with President Karzai.

Responding to a question about the article by Matthew Rosenburg in the Wall Street Journal, the Foreign Ministry Spokesperson rejected the baseless assertions made in it.

The Spokesperson added that Pakistan fully supports an Afghan-led, Afghan-owned process for peace and reconciliation. “This fundamental principle is now widely acknowledged,” she said.

The spokesperson said that Pakistan recognizes the key role of the United States in promoting stability, peace and harmony in Afghanistan.

A trilateral meeting of Afghanistan, Pakistan and the United States, at the senior officials’ level is being held in Islamabad early next month, she said. “The purpose of ongoing engagements with Afghanistan and the United States is to have strategic coherence and clarity”.

The WSJ claimed that Prime Gilani, who bluntly told Afghan President Hamid Karzai on an April 16 meeting in Kabul that the Americans had failed them both.

Quoting Afghans familiar with the meeting, the American daily reported that Mr. Karzai should forget about allowing a long-term U.S. military presence in his country.

Pakistan enjoys particular leverage in Afghanistan because of its historic role in fostering the Taliban movement and its continuing support for the Afghan Taliban insurgency. Washington's relations with Pakistan, ostensibly an ally, have reached their lowest point in years following a series of missteps on both sides, it said.