Definitely a major setback for Pakistan regardless of what the FM is saying, the groups that threaten Afghanistan and the region with roots in Pakistan were mentioned. The final
communique has signatures of China and Russia ( two main stakeholders) which Pakistan seem to bank on vis-a-vis US and her policies towards Pakistan and Afghanistan.
Now where does this leave Pakistan? I say Pakistan's policy towards Afghanistan is on life support and in need of
urgent pivot. One were Pakistan stops using these groups as a foreign policy tool and deal with Afghan on state-state level.
@Kaptaan :
@pakistani342
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https://www.geo.tv/latest/156689-brics-statement-cant-be-termed-foreign-policy-failure-says-asif
It seems the my dear
@A-Team, that you and your fellow Afghan compatriots are framing the question incorrectly.
The question is not if it is good or bad for Pakistan. The question is what difference will it make for Afghanistan.
Pakistan may temporarily scale back the support to these groups (it seems it already has done so -- not because any goodness of its heart -- but possibly because other actors will pick up the slack: Iran, Russia). But will the net effect have any tangible benefit to the Afghan people's project?
People are looking for a solution to the Afghan project -- something that can work in a reasonable timeframe, and for a price tag someone is will to foot. And even the people who are for the new Trump policy don't seem to have come up with a solution.
Afghanistan is too far, too insignificant, too fragmented, too poor, too unimaginative to be able to fix -- at least until someone comes up with an idea.
The other day on the sidelines of an event a friend of mine framed the problem very eloquently this way:
In the blue corner we have:
1. The Afghan Commandoes wearing pink uniforms selected by Wardak, sporting RayBans courtesy the US Tax Payer
2. Trained by the mightiest force the world has ever seen with Generals who studied at Princeton, Yale, West Point, Harvard, Stanford
3. 300,000+ in number
4. Defending a democratically elected government
5. Backed by air power
6. Funded to the tune of 6 dollars per year
In the red corner we have:
1. Some weird assed bearded ugly Mollahs clad in cheap plastic flip flops
2. Trained by corrupt generals of a 3rd world country graduates of Gooorrrrnamunt-College-Lahore, PMA, Karachi University, etc.
3. 30,000+ in number
4. oppressing a poor Afghan people
5. no air power support
7. funned to the tune of 1/2 a billion dollars a year through drug trade, extortion and other rackets
8. last but not least: bad body odor ontop of that
What should the result be? The Commandoha(s) should have won many years ago?
Yet now, quoting American Generals and saner thinkers: the momentum is decidedly with the Taliban.
What are we missing? Anybody?
We are turning the tide everyday on the ground as we speak. On the policy side, Pakistan being in the corner and a regional understanding that Pakistan is on the wrong side vis-a-vis Afghanistan a strategic win for us.
Big feat for a country that you consider a no state!!
To give you an idea of the poor situation of Afghanistan -- that the Afghan robotics team in the end were not even given visas -- they were given what is called a parol to come in to the US.
It is mind boggling that the Afghans think that they have gotten something in the new Trump policy.