Daily Times

Foreign ministers of China and Afghanistan were on a two-day visit to Islamabad for trilateral talks to discuss the security situation in Afghanistan and the region. The agenda also included thrashing out ways and means to promote stability in Afghanistan as well as the avenues for strengthening cooperation between the three countries in this regard. At the end of the trilateral talks China and Pakistan announced that they would stand with each other in the future decades like they have done in the past to ensure peace and stability in the region especially Afghanistan as it remained vital to the socio-economic prosperity connectivity and development in the region.

Both China and Pakistan pledged to work together to actively support and help Afghanistan in its economic reconstruction. However, it was felt that to facilitate the envisaged process Afghanistan needed to take seriously the security concerns of its neighbours by putting in place strong measures to counter various terror forces within Afghanistan. In their view, it was essential to live in harmony with its neighbours. They agreed to continue humanitarian and economic assistance for the Afghan people and enhance development cooperation at the same time emphasizing the need for international community to provide continued assistance and support to Afghanistan including through unfreezing its overseas financial assets.

The tri-lateral dialogue was a significant step in the backdrop of the obtaining security situation in the region particularly in Afghanistan, which is also affecting the neighbouring countries. China has made huge investments in the infrastructure development in Afghanistan and Pakistan also needs stability in that country for an effective connectivity with Central Asian State. It is pertinent to mention that more than any other country, Pakistan needs peace in Afghanistan which is also linked to peace within its own territory. It has been persistently making efforts to promote stability in Afghanistan at the bilateral and multilateral forums. Afghanistan also needs the cooperation of its neighbours to restore normalcy and rebuild the destroyed infrastructure. Peace in Afghanistan would be a win-win situation for all the stakeholders.

Afghanistan also needs the cooperation of its neighbours to restore normalcy and rebuild the destroyed infrastructure.

The positive outcome of event was that the Afghan foreign minister during the talks and in his interaction with COAS General Asim Munir appreciated Pakistan;s support for the people of Afghanistan and acknowledged the important role that Pakistan continues to play in facilitating peace and development in Afghanistan. He expressed his desire to work closely with Pakistan to promote regional stability and prosperity. From the foregoing development it can be safely inferred that the dialogue has produced a positive outcome.

China and Pakistan in their bilateral talks as usual reaffirmed their support for each other in regards to issues of vital concern to them. Pakistan expressed support for China on all its core issues including One-China Policy, Taiwan, Tibet, Xinjiang, Hong Kong and South China Sea. China on its part appreciated Pakistan’s efforts to fight terrorism, its position on IIOJ&K and also thanked Pakistan for the measures that it took to provide security to the Chinese personnel working on CPEC projects. That indeed was a reiteration of their being on one page in regards to these issues which is imperative to send an unequivocal message to the world in regards to the solidarity between the two countries on those issues. The bilateral talks covered the whole range of relations between the two countries with both sides promising to enhance their cooperation in all those domains.

In the joint presser with his Chinese counterpart foreign minister Bilawal Bhutto expressed gratitude to China for its generous and timely assistance when the country was grappling with the headwinds in a global economy and reiterated that Pakistan remained against bloc politics or great power competition of any kind. At the same time he acknowledged that CPEC remained a shining example of the BRI which has accelerated socio-economic development, job creation and improvement of the people’s livelihood in Pakistan.

Chinese foreign minister expressed firm support for Pakistan’s sovereignty, independence, territorial integrity as well as its unity, stability and economic prosperity and said that China would as always work with Pakistan through the platform of CPEC, align development strategies of both countries and share China’s development opportunities and build an even closer China-Pakistan Community with a shared future. It is hard to take an issue with what the Chinese foreign minister said in the context of bilateral relations between the two countries. China has always stood with Pakistan and played a very pivotal role in its economic development and enhancement of its defence capability which is an undeniable reality.

China has made huge investments in CPEC projects and of late it has also indicated its willingness to build a rail link between Kashghar and Gawadar costing $ 58 billion. When a country makes such huge investments it surely wants peace and stability in the country where investments are made or are likely to be made to achieve the desired objective of the effort.

China is a trustworthy partner of Pakistan. The two countries have an exemplary friendship which has withstood the vicissitudes of time and maintained uninterrupted upward graph. The relations signify impregnable brotherly amity. China undoubtedly is a well-wisher of Pakistan and it was surely in that context that the Chinese foreign minister said” China sincerely hopes Pakistan political forces can get together and overcome issues of political stability so that they can grow on the economic front together with us. Unless there is internal stability in Pakistan CPEC projects cannot move ahead”

Nobody in his right mind can deny the desirability of political stability as a catalyst to socio-economic development. When the suggestion comes from an iron-brother it needs to be appreciated and taken in the same spirit. The effort by some circles to construe it as interference in Pakistan’s internal affairs is the most preposterous proposition. Equally hypocritical is the stance taken by a political party that what the Chinese foreign minister said was endorsement of its stance in regards to the permeating situation in the country. China would be the last country to say anything reflecting partisan views about prevailing situation in the Pakistan. It was the expression of a wish by the iron brother to see political stability in Pakistan without which one cannot even conceive of economic development. Those trying to do politics on the statement of the Chinese foreign minister must resist their propensity to politicize everything and seeing them from their own standpoint instead of giving an honest perspective on them.

The writer is a former diplomat and freelance columnist.