US envoy on Afghan peace takes his mission to Pakistan

By Kathy Gannon | AP

October 9 at 5:07 AM

ISLAMABAD — Washington’s newly named point man tasked with finding a peaceful end to Afghanistan’s 17-year war is in Pakistan to seek help from the new government in Islamabad in bringing the Taliban to the negotiating table, the U.S. Embassy said Tuesday.

A former U.S. ambassador in Kabul, Zalmay Khalilzad arrived in Pakistan from neighboring Afghanistan. His tour of the region will also include Middle East stops in the United Arab Emirates, Qatar and Saudi Arabia.

In Afghanistan, he met with President Ashraf Ghani, a long-time friend. Khalilzad, who was also born in Afghanistan, first served in Kabul as a special envoy of President George W. Bush following the 2001 ouster of the Taliban, and then later as Washington’s ambassador.

But Khalilzad has had a prickly relationship with Pakistan and has often accused Islamabad of fomenting violence in Afghanistan by supporting the Taliban. He has even said the United States should declare Pakistan a terrorist state.

Washington and Kabul have both repeatedly accused Pakistan of providing safe havens for Taliban insurgents, a claim Islamabad has denied and countered with charges that its own insurgents have found sanctuary in Afghanistan.

Pakistan’s new Prime Minister Imran Khan has been a strident critic of Islamabad’s previous participation in Washington’s so-called war on terror. However, he promised after winning the polls in July that his government would be “partners in peace.” It is not clear what that would entail but Pakistan has supported Afghan President Ghani’s peace overtures to the Taliban. - More

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