LAHORE, March 16: Relations between Pakistan and Afghanistan will be cemented further with the forthcoming visit of Afghan President Hamid Karzai to Islamabad, Foreign Minister Mian Khurshid Mehmood Kasuri told Dawn here on Sunday.

Karzai, who will be the chief guest at the army parade in Islamabad on the Pakistan Day (March 23), will visit Lahore the following day.

“The visit of the Afghan president will be very important. It shows that relations between the countries are improving very fast”, Mr Kasuri said.

Pakistan would impart training to foreign office officials of Afghanistan at the Foreign Service Academy.

The visit, the minister said, would also improve economic cooperation between the two countries.

Pakistan is giving Afghanistan $100 million assistance, part of which has already been disbursed.

Islamabad, the foreign minister said, was committed to playing its role in the reconstruction of Afghanistan under the Bonn Accord.

Once the accord was implemented in its entirety, all ethnic groups would get representation in the Afghan government, Mr Kasuri said.

Other diplomatic sources say that the two countries are already cooperating with each other in war on terrorism and they are also sharing intelligence.

They say that the pace of improvement between the two countries could be gauged by the fact that about a dozen Afghan ministers met Mr Kasuri during the past few months and discussed cooperation in various fields.