Afghanistan’s official Ambassador to Russia, Abdul Qayyum Kochai has stated that he welcomes Russia’s role in mediating a diplomatic peace process in his country.
Abdul Qayyum Kochai said,
“We would like Russia to help the Afghans as well in order to achieve safety and peace in Afghanistan … We want the relations with Russia to be very good, despite the fact that there have been some problems throughout history”.
The Ambassador further condemned the American role in the country which is putitively in aid of the governing. About this he stated,
“We wanted the US troops and troops of other Western countries, which have close relations with Afghanistan, to leave Afghanistan long ago. We have now very powerful troops. They fight against terrorism, against Taliban, against Daesh. We can do this”.
This comes as Moscow’s Presidential Envoy to Kabul offered a robust defence of Pakistan’s record against terrorism and the important role Islamabad has played in its attempts to bring stability to Afghanistan.
Envoy Zamir Kabulov said,
“Putting pressure (on Pakistan) may seriously destabilise the region-wide security situation and result in negative consequences for Afghanistan”.
Russia has continually called for dialogue between the government in Kabul and moderate rebels within various prominent Taliban factions. Moscow insists that a ceasefire combined with intense dialogue is the only way to bring stability to Afghanistan while creating a united front against ISIS which is opposed by both the government in Kabul, the Taliban and the majority of non-aligned Pashtun militants.
China, Russia and elements of the Afghan government are united in their opposition to Donald Trump’s troop surge and his provocative statements about South Asia.
As I recently wrote in The Duran:
“China is all too aware that The United States is isolated in the region in respect of a peace process. Iran is increasingly seeing things along the same lines as Russia and China and in any case, the chances of Donald Trump working with Iran anywhere are nil. The lone exception to this pattern of isolation is India. Under Modi, New Delhi may use Trump’s offer to try and upset the status quo of the region in which all of the key powers are increasingly cooperating with China’s One Belt–One Road project, India being the lone country which under Modi is increasingly hellbent on antagonising China at every opportunity.
With this in mind, China has issued the following statement:
“Donald Trump talked about close US-Indian relations, we are glad to see the development of normal and friendly relations between these countries if these relations do not harm other countries’ interests and create positive conditions for regional development”.
China’s position is clear, India is welcome in Afghanistan as such a thing is not up to China in any case and Beijing is comfortable with this reality of international law. What China is not comfortably with is India’s presence in Afghanistan acting as a force which could impede the progress of important projects with Pakistan, namely the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor. The statement above makes this known implicitly.
In a worst case scenario, India could disrupt a peace process involving dialogue with the Taliban that could distract Pakistan from its long term goals in China. However, Pakistan under its current leadership would appear to be steadfast in its commitments to China. Distractions won’t work as well as they would have done even 10 years ago”.
READ MORE: China tells Trump not to allow India to interfere in regional interests.
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