UNITED NATIONS: Pakistan has expressed the hope that the U.S.-Taliban talks, which were abruptly suspended over the weekend, would soon resume and open the way towards intra-Afghan negotiations that would lead to a peaceful settlement of the long-drawn conflict in Afghanistan. “We hope the suspension of the peace talks is only a pause and will resume sooner rather than later as the alternative is a surge in violence, which could push Afghanistan into even more turbulent and uncertain phase than has been witnessed so far,” Ambassador Maleeha Lodhi told the UN Security Council, while assuring of Pakistan’s role as a facilitator of the Afghan peace process. Speaking in a debate on the situation in Afghanistan, she said Pakistan had always condemned violence and called for all sides to exercise restraint and to remain committed to the peace process out of its belief that there was no military solution to the Afghan conflict.