ISLAMABAD: The Foreign Office on Wednesday rejected Afghan President Ashraf Ghani’s allegation that the recent Kandahar attack was plotted in Pakistan, saying Kabul had not provided any proof to back up its claim.
“Pakistan rejects baseless and unfounded allegations regarding the latest Kandahar attacks. No hard evidence or intelligence-related information has been shared to date with Pakistan to substantiate such claims,” an FO statement said.
Top security and intelligence leadership of Kandahar (Afghanistan) was killed in an insider attack on Oct 18. One of the members of the provincial governor’s guard fired at the participants in a security meeting that was also attended by top US commander in Afghanistan Gen Scott Miller. The US commander remained unhurt. Those killed in the attack included powerful Afghan police commander Gen Abdul Raziq Achakzai and regional head of the National Directorate of Security Gen Abdul Momin Hassankhail.
President Ghani, during a visit to Kandahar, said: “I want to say that this conspiracy was plotted in Pakistan. Pakistan should therefore give us the criminals so that we can bring them to justice.”
The FO said that the Afghan president instead of engaging in a blame game should use the recently agreed framework of cooperation to share information and seek help for investigating the matter.
“In the presence of elaborate mechanisms under Afghanistan-Pakistan Action Plan for Peace and Stability to mutually and effectively address and investigate any such unfortunate incidents, it would have been more appropriate to invoke the relevant arrangement instead of resorting to media blame game which is contrary to the seven principles of cooperation agreed between the two sides, earlier this year,” the FO said.
Both Kabul and Washington have repeatedly accused Islamabad of not uprooting alleged Taliban sanctuaries on its soil.
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo repeated that allegation while talking to reporters in Washington recently. He said: “Our expectation is that Pakistan will not provide safe harbour to terrorists on their western border.”
“Pakistan will be held to account if they don’t achieve that, if they’re not sincere in that effort,” he warned.
Pulished in Dawn, October 25th , 2018
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