ISLAMABAD: The Doha agreement between the Afghan Taliban and the US proved detrimental to the region’s peace and stability, a National Assembly panel observed on Tuesday.

National Assembly Stan­ding Committee on Foreign Affairs’ head Mohsin Dawar said the nature of the agreement — signed in February 2020 in Qatar’s capital Doha to end the war in Afghanistan — and the preceding negotiations were exclusionary in nature.

Addressing the committee’s meeting on Tuesday, he added that Pakistan facilitated the deal without realising its potentially adverse implications for regional peace and stability.

He recalled that the engagement of elected representatives saved Pakistan from a potentially similar outcome during the issue of sending troops to Yemen. Instead, the parliament decided to maintain a neutral position in the conflict, Mr Dawar added.

Mr Dawar said there was a need for transparency and engagement of people’s representatives in the Pak-US counter-terrorism cooperation.

He stressed that counter-terrorism cooperation and defence dialogues should be carried out to advance Pakistan’s national interest and promote regional stability.

Foreign Secretary Asad Majeed and officials of foreign affairs and defence ministries briefed the committee on Pak-US counter-terrorism cooperation and defence dialogues.

The committee was told that the Pak-US Counter-Terrorism Dialogue took place in Islamabad on March 6 and 7. Similarly, mid-level defence dialogue took place in 2021 and 2023 in Washington.

FO officials said these dialogues have been revi­ved after a gap with significant changes in the format of the dialogue and two additional tracks, health and climate change, have been added.

Published in Dawn, April 12th, 2023