Pakistan has called on the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) to take decisive action against terrorism in neighbouring Afghanistan, with Pakistani Ambassador to the UN Munir Akram highlighting the threat of allowing terrorists to operate in the region with impunity.

This comes days after Afghan Taliban authorities said they will attend the third round of United Nations-hosted talks on Afghanistan in the Qatari capital Doha on June 30 and July 1, after snubbing an invitation to the previous round.

The Taliban government’s participation in the conference of foreign special envoys to Afghanistan had been in doubt after it was not included in the first round and then refused an invitation to the second round in February.

“A delegation of the Islamic Emirate will participate in the coming Doha conference. They will represent Afghanistan there and express Afghanistan’s position,” Zabihullah Mujahid told AFP.

Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of Afghan refugees have been expelled to their homeland since a deadline of November 1 last year, as part of government activity to crack down on terrorism.

According to Radio Pakistan, Akram emphasised that Afghanistan’s goals of socioeconomic development cannot be achieved while terrorist organisations like the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and Islamic State in Khorasan Province (IS-K) remain active.

“While the AIG (Afghan Interim Government) is fighting Daesh (IS-K) and has made some progress, there are a number of other terrorist groups in Afghanistan,” he said.

“Al-Qaeda, TTP, ETIM, IMU all these groups, against whom the AIG must take effective and sustained action, including in compliance with several resolutions of the Security Council,” he said, highlighting that the TTP poses the most direct and serious threat to Pakistan.

“The TTP and its associates have been responsible for numerous cross-border attacks against Pakistan, resulting in hundreds of civilian and military casualties.”

Akram said despite Pakistan’s repeated calls to Afghanistan to take action against the TTP, “no meaningful action has been taken”.

He emphasised that TTP safe havens along the Pak-Afghan border still exist, enabling them to execute attacks including the one that killed Chinese engineers working on the Dassu hydroelectric project earlier this year.

Akram urged the UNSC to call on the Afghan government to sever its links with and disarm the TTP and hand over captured TTP leaders to Pakistan.

“The UN should also investigate how the TTP acquired its advanced weapons and the sources of the TTP’s funding, including from external sources, which enables it to maintain up to 50,000 TTP fighters and their families,” he added.

The ambassador reminded the Security Council about its obligation to Afghans affected by terrorism and in need of humanitarian aid.