ISLAMABAD: National Security Advisor Moeed Yusuf on Saturday asserted that it was the collective responsibility of the international community not to create a humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan, urging the world for constructive engagement with Taliban.
In an article published in UK-based online newspaper, the Pakistan NSA stressed that “walking away from Afghanistan would be tantamount to giving up on the millions of Afghans that remain inside the country”.
“The Taliban have signalled their intention to work with the international community, which opens up space for the world to constructively engage with Afghanistan,” the Security Advisor wrote.
He further said Pakistan supported the idea of a negotiated political settlement as the only way to end the war in Afghanistan responsibly. “We were badly affected by the war in Afghanistan,” he added.
The Security Advisor pointed out that Pakistan lost more than 80,000 lives in the Afghanistan war and bore more than $150 billion dollars in economic losses.
Moeed Yusuf also criticized India for destabilizing the region, saying that the neighboring country was making fake statements against Pakistan and used Afghan territory for terrorism against Pakistan.
Earlier this week, Yusuf warned against isolating Afghanistan as Western powers – while pledging immediate humanitarian aid – are largely holding off on any further financial assistance or formal recognition of the Taliban government while the US has frozen roughly $10 billion of Afghanistan central bank assets.
“Humanitarian assistance is a stop-gap arrangement to ensure there is no immediately humanitarian crisis, that does not equate to governance, institutional and economic support which is needed by any country to survive in the conditions that you find (in) Afghanistan,” he had said.
