Foreign Office (FO) spokesperson Tahir Hussain Andrabi said on Sunday that Pakistan welcomed Iran’s offer of mediation between Islamabad and Kabul and would “not shy away from” it.
“Iran is a brotherly, friendly country. Pakistan is always in favour of finding peaceful resolutions of issues through dialogue and diplomacy, and we appreciate the offer of mediation of our brotherly country, Iran,” Andrabi told the media upon a query about reports that Tehran was working to convene a regional meeting for mediation between Islamabad and the Afghan Taliban. He stated: “Generally, mediations are resented by a country or a side which is on a weak legal or a political case. Pakistan’s case on this issue, on terrorism emanating from Afghanistan, is very strong. So, obviously we will not shy away from mediation.”
Intense border clashes between Pakistan and Afghanistan started late on the night of October 11 night and continued into the next morning. The Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) said that 23 Pakistani troops were martyred and 200 Taliban and affiliated terrorists were killed when Islamabad responded to aggression by Kabul.
Afghanistan claimed it carried out the attack as a “retaliatory” measure, accusing Islamabad of conducting air strikes in its territory. For its part, Islamabad did not confirm or deny whether it was behind the strikes, but maintained that Kabul should “stop harbouring the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan on its soil”.
A ceasefire was then agreed upon on the evening of October 15, and eventually, the two sides came together for dialogue in Doha. After the Doha talks, a temporary ceasefire continued to prevent border hostilities while the two sides committed to reconvene in Istanbul to work on mechanisms for lasting peace and stability between the two countries.
On October 25, the second round of talks between the two sides began in the Turkish capital. But, Information Minister Attaullah Tarar announced in a post on X on October 29 that the talks “failed to bring about any workable solution”. He also asserted that Pakistan would continue to take all possible measures to protect its citizens from terrorism.
However, mediators Turkiye and Qatar intervened and managed to salvage the dialogue process, with an October 31 joint statement released by Turkiye stating that “further modalities of the implementation will be discussed and decided” during a principal-level meeting in Istanbul on November 6.
On November 7, the defence minister said that talks addressing cross-border terrorism were “over” and “entered an indefinite phase” as negotiators failed to bridge deep differences between the two sides.