India-Afghanistan
Will do whatever in our power and influence to protect Afghan people: India
Iterating that Afghanistan needed double peace - peace within and around it - Indian External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar has described US President Joe Biden's announcement to withdraw American forces as a big step and asserted New Delhi would do whatever is in its power and influence to protect the best interests of the Afghan people.
“We’ve always believed that there should be an Afghan-led, Afghan-owned and Afghan controlled process, which essentially is a way of saying that, what is good for Afghanistan should be decided by Afghans,” Jaishankar said participating in the Raisina Dialogue in New Delhi this week.
Jaishankar was participating in a conversation "Kabul Junction: The road to Peace” along with Mohammad Javad Zarif, Minister of Foreign Affairs, Iran and Hamdullah Mohib, National Security Adviser of Afghanistan.
The Indian minister, an ace diplomat, stressed the importance for everybody to work together to ensure a good outcome for Pakistan.
“What all of us see in President Biden's announcement is a big a step which is going to take Afghanistan in a certain direction and it's important that we all work together to ensure that the direction is right and the outcomes are good for Afghanistan.,” he said.
Biden announced earlier this week the US troops would be withdrawn from Afghanistan beginning May 1, with the process getting completed by September 11 - two decades after 9/11 that set of the "war on terror" in Afghanistan and deployment of a peak of 100,000 troops.
Without mentioning Pakistan, Jashankar said Afghanistan’s neighbors have very often played a very ‘negative role’, and need to lay off the landlocked country.
“Afghanistan needs a double peace, it needs peace within, and it needs a peace around. Without and unless you have both, the neighbors also need to lay off Afghanistan and let the Afghan people do what is in their best interest,” he said.
He said India has undertaken development project in all the 34 Afghan provinces.
“I think in the last 20 years, we have demonstrated through our actions and projects on the ground, what our real feelings are for Afghanistan. So we believe today that there is goodwill for us, that there is a strong Indo Afghan friendship…
“We will do whatever is in our power, in our influence, in relationship with other neighbours to ensure what is the best interests of the Afghan people is ensured,” he said.
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