The recent US strategy for Afghanistan gives a glimmer of hope in terms of the country's peace talks progress, but it would be even more advantageous for the Afghan settlement if Washington collaborated with Russia and China on the peace process, former Afghan President Hamid Karzai said on Wednesday.
SOCHI (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 17th October, 2018) The recent US strategy for Afghanistan gives a glimmer of hope in terms of the country's peace talks progress, but it would be even more advantageous for the Afghan settlement if Washington collaborated with Russia and China on the peace process, former Afghan President Hamid Karzai said on Wednesday.
In July, the White House ordered that direct talks with Taliban radical movement be launched in order to revive the Afghan peace talks. Since then two rounds of talks between the US officials and Taliban representatives have taken place, with the last one having been held on Friday, October 12.
"Today, as I speak to you, there is now a glimmer of hope in the US announcement of the new policy for trying to bring peace to Afghanistan. They have announced that they will speak to the Taliban, they have already spoken to the Taliban," Karzai said at a press conference within the framework of the Valdai Discussion Club's annual meeting in the Russian resort city of Sochi.
But the former Afghan leader pointed to the fact that there were also peace processes for Afghanistan initiated by Moscow and Beijing.
"We hope that the United States will earnestly and sincerely pursue cooperation with our neighbors and especially with Russia and China, the two countries that are involved, interested and have security concerns and also have peace plans of their own," Karzai stressed.
Afghanistan has long been suffering from an unstable political, social and security situation due to simmering insurgency of the Taliban radical movement. The violence is exacerbated by the activities of various terrorist groups, including the Islamic State (IS, banned in Russia). China and Russia, each providing the venues for the talks on Afghan settlement, have been making every effort to facilitate the talks between the warring parties in the Islamic republic.
