WASHINGTON: International special envoys for Pakistan and Afghanistan are meeting in Paris on Wednesday to review the current situation in the two countries, the US State Department said.

The department spokesman Ian C. Kelly told a briefing that international special representatives for Afghanistan and Pakistan met and spoke on a regular basis to discuss issues related to the two countries. The Paris talks, he said, would cover a wide range of issues relating to Pakistan and Afghanistan.

The US media, however, reported that this was an emergency meeting called to discuss the post-election situation in Afghanistan.

US special envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Holbrooke will also attend the meeting. The State Department spokesman disagreed with a US media report suggesting that Washington was micromanaging the affairs in Kabul, often ignoring the US ambassador and military commanders in the country.

‘I respectfully disagree with that criticism,’ the spokesman said. ‘There is a great deal of communication between Washington and Kabul.’

He said the US administration was trying ‘to be patient’ in dealing with the complaints of fraud in the Afghan elections and wanted to ‘let this Afghan-led process play out’.

‘I would reject any accusations of meddling. We’ve been very scrupulous to allow this election to be an Afghan-led and -developed process,’ he added.

‘We, of course, have pointed out some of the concerns that we have. You’ve seen a lot of accusations of fraud. And we urge … Afghan institutions to take these allegations very seriously.’