NEW DELHI: A day before it goes to landmark elections, Afghanistan today sought a “more pro-active” role by India to help it deal with key challenges of security and stability and said terror infrastructure “across the border” must be smashed for lasting peace in the region.
Afghan Ambassador Shaida Mohammad Abdali said his country has come a long way in the last 13 years and the elections would mark a new dawn in its aspirations to become a prosperous and stable nation.
“This is a major milestone in our history. This is going to be a great achievement as there is going to be transition of power in a democratic way. This is going to be a great, great achievement,” he told PTI in an interview.
The elections will be held in Afghanistan tomorrow to elect a successor of incumbent Hamid Karzai who had come to power after fall of the Taliban in 2001. The contenders for the top posts are former Foreign Ministers Abdullah Abdullah and Zalmai Rassoul and former Finance Minister Ashraf Ghani.
Identifying terrorism as the biggest threat facing Afghanistan, Abdali said India as a “close friend” must do more to help the country overcome security challenges besides extending help in its reconstruction.
“We would like to see India to be more proactive in terms of being on the side of Afghanistan to safeguard its own interest and help Afghanistan safeguard its interests. We would like to see more of that happening as soon as possible.
“We are grateful to India for whatever it has done to Afghanistan. India has gone out of the way. But certainly we would like to see more in all areas. We are facing challenges that are common to us,” the Ambassador said.
India has been involved in various infrastructure projects in the country besides providing military hardware to it.
To meet the challenges of combating terrorism, he advocated greater effort by India, China and Russia while emphasizing that an “aggressive approach” must be adopted to deal with the problem in Afghanistan and in the region.
“In the long run, we hope India, China and Russia engaging more than ever on Afghanistan and in the region as a whole. We would like to see more in terms of engagements so that we all are together in seeing the problem (terrorism) finished,” he said. .
In an apparent reference to Pakistan, Abdali said Afghanistan was “under attack” from its own neighbors and it was time to “act swiftly” to combat the challenge that is “growing up every day”.
“Unfortunately we see infiltration into Afghanistan from across the border. We still see threats coming from there,” he said.
Seeking strong resolve to dismantle terror infrastructure, he said, “We have requested international allies that Afghanistan should be helped in addressing the problem of terrorism that needs us to go beyond Afghanistan.”
“Certainly,” Abdali replied when asked whether Pakistan was influencing Taliban not to join the peace process.
“There is no point of denial as to where Talibans are nurtured, where they are kept. I think it is no more a secret that Talibans are influenced by certain elements in our neighborhood, it’s clear,” he said.
The Ambassador said though Pakistan Prime Minister had stated that he wanted a peaceful and stable Afghanistan, his words have not been translated into action.
“Nawaz Sharif on number of occasions has expressed his position, which is different from any other government, to say that they want a peaceful and stable Afghanistan and they want to have no interference in Afghanistan. We would like to see those words into action.
“We would like to see cooperation that is visible and that cooperation should be in a manner and in form to see the Taliban to be brought by them to the table,” he said.
Asked about expectations from the new government in India after the elections, he said the ties between the two countries will not depend on which political party comes to power.
But at the same time, he added that there was need to move away from “traditional conservative politics to a pragmatic approach by both countries” to deal with the challenges.
On withdrawal of foreign forces this year, he said over 350,000 Afghan forces have taken responsibility of security in the country and they were capable of it.–PTI
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