UNITED NATIONS, July 27: The UN envoy for Afghanistan warned on Wednesday that foreign fighters had again become a major threat as the country fights off a mounting Taliban-inspired insurgency.

The warning came as the UN Security Council expressed renewed concern over the resurgence of the Taliban and called for greater military and political support for the government.

The UN envoy, Tom Koenigs, said the Taliban, overthrown in a US-led invasion in 2001, were rediscovering their strength as they fight back from bases in southern Afghanistan. He said the fighting in Afghanistan now had to be called ‘an insurgency’ rather than just ‘isolated acts of terrorism’.

“There are international elements in it, there are cross border fighters coming from a neighbouring country and being trained and also being financed from other countries,” Koenigs told reporters after briefing the Security Council.

“This is a threat, and this is a challenge also in the diplomatic area.”

The Taliban, he said, has “had the opportunity to regain strength, to reestablish their leadership over this movement and to reconquer their structures.

“This is impossible without the support of third parties — let it be international terrorist networks, let it be countries that do not control part of their territory,” said Koenigs.

“What is necessary is close cooperation between Afghanistan and Pakistan on this subject and it is necessary for the international community to ‘dry out’ the finances of this movement,” he added.

“There is no indication that any government, openly or covertly, supports the Taliban because the Taliban are a threat to the stability of any country.”

Koenigs said he had met Pakistan’s President Pervez Musharraf who had admitted he was ‘concerned about the threat of the Talibanisation of Pakistan’.

Jean-Marc de La Sabliere, French ambassador and president of the Security Council for July, read a council statement after the meeting.

“The Security Council expressed concern about the security situation in Afghanistan against a backdrop of increasing activity by the Taliban and other groups,” said the statement.

The council ‘welcomed moves toward democracy’ made by the government of President Hamid Karzai ‘and expressed hope that the pace of reform will accelerate’.

Koenigs said the Taliban ‘has to be answered with a series of measures, political and military’ by the international community.

He said it was not possible to ‘strike a deal’ with the hardline militia because it had not attended talks but that the Afghanistan government’s reconciliation programme has to be ‘reinvigorated’.—AFP