Pak-Afghan relations: In a sign of thaw, Khar to visit Kabul

Army and intelligence chiefs, FM, PM Gilani held a detailed meeting to discuss the regional security situation.

ISLAMABAD:

The flight to reconciliation between Islamabad and Washington will land first in Kabul, and on-board will be Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar.

The civil and military leadership on Tuesday decided to send the foreign minister to Afghanistan as part of a re-engagement process on charting the Afghan endgame. The move may also help normalise the strained Pak-US relationship.

The army and intelligence chiefs, and the foreign minister, called on Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani and “held a detailed meeting to discuss the regional security situation,” said a release from the Prime Minister House.

The ongoing reconciliation process in Afghanistan was also discussed in the meeting, the press release added. The premier asked the foreign minister to visit Kabul to restart the engagement process.

Prior to this meeting, the foreign minister met the US ambassador to Pakistan Cameron Munter.

Pakistan had recently turned down a US request for its special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan Marc Grossman’s visit to Islamabad, saying the country was going through an internal ‘re-evaluation process.’

Grossman, who reportedly sought Islamabad’s help in negotiating with the Afghan Taliban, visited New Delhi instead.

As part of its pullout from the war-torn country, the US plans on reducing its on-ground presence in Afghanistan. While Kabul has requested American presence beyond 2014, fearing collapse of the fragile Karzai government, the country’s neighbours, primarily Pakistan, Iran, China and Russia, are opposed to continued US presence beyond the planned withdrawal in 2014.

Pak-US ties

The civilian and military leadership also discussed the normalisation of Pak-US ties and cooperation in the war on terror.

A parliamentary panel on national security has already finalised its recommendations, based on broad parameters, vis-à-vis Pak-US relations. The recommendations will be discussed in a joint session of parliament, likely to be convened in the coming week.

The bilateral relations were in free-fall throughout 2011, and hit a low point after the May 2 US raid on Osama bin Laden’s compound in Abbottabad.

The relations hit a nadir again in November after 24 Pakistani soldiers were killed in an aerial attack by US-led forces at a border checkpost.

In protest, Pakistan shut down the Nato supply route and made the US vacate the Shamsi airbase in Balochistan.

Reports, however have recently surfaced that Pakistan would reopen the supply routes after revising the charges paid by NATO forces.

Recent drone attacks in North Waziristan, however, appear to have reduced the chances of an early resumption.

Memogate

Analysts also said Tuesday’s meeting between the premier and the army and intelligence chiefs was significant, given Gilani’s earlier accusations that the service chiefs had acted unconstitutionally by submitting their replies directly to the Supreme Court in the Memogate case.

There is no official confirmation, however, that Memogate came under discussion.

US rejects Pakistan probe

The US on Monday rejected the findings of a Pakistani probe into the November 24 Nato air strikes, saying the investigation ignored the fact that ‘mistakes’ were made on both sides.

At a press briefing, Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said the Pakistan Army had officially delivered a copy of the report during the weekend.

“The statement that this was an unprovoked attack by US forces is simply false,” said Navy Captain Kirby. “It was not an unprovoked attack,” he said. “There were errors made by both sides here.”

Kirby said the Pentagon was “100 per cent” behind the findings of the investigation report released last month by the US military. That report, while acknowledging some responsibility in the bombing of Pakistani border posts, argued that Nato troops had fired in “self-defence” after being shot at by “heavy weapons and mortar” from an “unidentified” source in a remote area infiltrated by Taliban organisations.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 25^th, 2012.