WILAYAH NEWS VOICE OF THE GLOBAL AWAKENING
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A growing number of experts believe that countries in the Middle East and West Asia regions are showing an increasing willingness to use regional dispute settlement mechanisms in order to curtail interference in their internal affairs by the West, especially the United States, which uses such disputes as excuse.
This comes as China has taken a series of diplomatic steps to normalize bilateral relations between Pakistan and Afghanistan, which is important for the establishment of peace in the region.
According to the Chinese Foreign Ministry, the first round of trilateral talks among the foreign ministers of Afghanistan, China and Pakistan will be held in Beijing on Tuesday. Foreign Minister of Pakistan Khawaja Asif, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi and Acting Afghan Foreign Minister Salahuddin Rabbani will attend the dialogue in the Chinese capital on December 26.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman, Hua Chunying, confirmed last week that the talks were aimed at enhancing trilateral cooperation as well as strengthening stability and development in the region.
She said, “As a common neighbor and friend of Afghanistan and Pakistan, China always supports Afghanistan and Pakistan to live in friendship and achieve common development.”
“This will be the first round of China-Afghanistan-Pakistan trilateral foreign ministers’ dialogue. The three countries will have in-depth communication on three topics, namely, mutual political trust and reconciliation, developing cooperation and connectivity, and security cooperation and counter-terrorism,” she added.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson said the Chinese side hoped that through this dialogue, the three countries could “build up consensus, enhance mutual trust, promote the improvement of Afghanistan-Pakistan relations, enhance trilateral cooperation and jointly stay committed to the peace, stability and development of this region.”
Elsewhere in her remarks, Hua noted that during the Chinese foreign minister’s visit to Afghanistan and Pakistan in June, the three countries agreed to establish the trilateral dialogue mechanism, which will serve as a platform to enhance talks and cooperation among them.
Many political analysts see the dialogue as a rare and bold move by China aimed at achieving regional stability.
One cannot ignore the fact that China’s growing diplomatic and political stature in the world requires it to assume a more effective role in resolving regional and international disputes. Afghanistan is a test case for China for it entails diverse internal, regional and international conflict dynamics.
Removing the deep-seated mistrust between Afghanistan and Pakistan, however, would not be an easy task as Pakistan and Afghanistan regularly accuse each other of sheltering their enemy insurgents. Both sides, however, deny such an allegation.
Kabul blames elements in the Pakistani spy agency, the ISI, for supporting Taliban militants, while Islamabad accuses the Afghan government of sheltering militants on its side of the border. The two sides also accuse one another of not doing enough to stop militants engaging in cross-border raids.
Afghanistan has been gripped by insecurity since the United States and its allies invaded the country as part of Washington’s so-called war on terror in 2001. Many parts of the country remain plagued by militancy despite the presence of foreign troops. During the past 16 years, the Taliban militants have been conducting terrorist attacks across the country, killing and displacing civilians.
In addition, Daesh Takfiri terrorist group, which was mainly active in Syria and Iraq before suffering territorial defeats in the two countries, has recently managed to take recruits from Afghan Taliban defectors. Militants are now launching attacks on both Pakistani and Afghan soil.
While all the above facts indicate disastrous failure of US policies in this country, the administration of US President Donald Trump has recently accused Islamabad of not doing enough to counter terrorism in the region, trying to shift blame to its age-old ally in the region.
Of course, Trump’s accusations are nothing new as successive US governments have criticized Pakistan for links with the Taliban and for harboring slain al-Qaeda leader, Osama bin Laden.
Senior civilian and military officials in Islamabad have frequently said the US government is making Pakistan a scapegoat to cover Washington’s failure in Afghanistan.
Responding to a series of barbs by Trump in August, Naeem Khalid Lodhi, a Pakistani defense analyst and retired general, said the United States was to blame for its own failure in Afghanistan.
“They are shifting blame to Pakistan,” he said, adding, “Pakistan should not remain silent against such US behavior and we should work to build a new political and strategical bloc with big powers like Russia and China.”
The Chinese-sponsored talks come as Iranian Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani has called on China and Pakistan to join a counter-terrorism campaign, which Iran is spearheading jointly with Russia and Turkey in Syria, saying that the coalition is an alternative to the one led by the US, which has caused a “security mess.” He made the remarks while speaking to reporters in the Pakistani capital of Islamabad on Monday on the sidelines of a conference on the challenge of terrorism and inter-regional connectivity.
Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani made the appeal during a conference in Islamabad attended by Pakistan, Russia, China, Turkey and Afghanistan.
The developments come as Iran, Russia and Turkey have been seeking to put an end to a six-year conflict in Syria through holding several rounds of peace talks in Astana, the capital city of Kazakhstan.
Iran, Russia and Turkey are acting as the guarantors of a ceasefire that took effect in Syria late last year.
They have also underlined the need for continued battle against terrorism until the eradication of Daesh and all other Takfiri terrorist outfits in Syria.
