Minister for Information and Broadcasting Chaudhry Fawad Hussain on Wednesday said Pakistan has been in talks with the Taliban and it also facilitated their talks with the United States. “I will not say that we have no engagement with [the] Taliban. It was Pakistan’s engagement with [the] Taliban that enabled US-Taliban negotiations. It was Pakistan’s and Afghanistan’s engagement that enabled and facilitated the evacuation of thousands of people stuck in Kabul,” he said in a brief interview with BBC World. “This engagement is now being appreciated by the world,” he added. The BBC anchor asked for a comment on the presence of ISI chief Lieutenant General Faiz Hameed, who visited Kabul a couple of days back. “Before this, the media reported that the CIA chief was in Kabul, then the media reported that the Turkish and Qatari intelligence chiefs were also in Kabul, Fawad said, adding that in the absence of any formal government in Kabul, obviously intelligence agencies will create an alternative framework. Fawad said Pakistan has ‘deep issues’ with Afghanistan, giving the expansion of Daesh, migration and TTP as some of the examples. “For this reason, Pakistan has to have an informal line of communication. Afghanistan has no foreign minister and asked if Pakistan was to send its foreign minister, who would he meet? This is the only framework to communicate,” he maintained. Fawad said Pakistan assisted and evacuated thousands of foreign nationals from Afghanistan which was appreciated by the international community. He said there was no military solution to Afghanistan issue and this was what Pakistan had been trying to convince since 2007. “Had Pakistan’s advice been paid heed the situation in Afghanistan today would have been different,” he said. “Pakistan lost 80,000 lives due to Afghan war and suffered $150 billion economic losses while India is constantly trying to defame Pakistan through baseless propaganda,” he added. “Frankly, its fairytales crafted by the Indian media and put all over social media where they use a video game to demonstrate that Pakistan is helping the attack on Panjshir,” Fawad remarked when asked about the alleged involvement of Pakistan in the attacks on Panjshir. “When I see this in Afghanistan and some of the Indian media, I feel that we are some supernatural power and we can do everything we want. Countries don’t act like that,” he said. Chaudhry said that in Afghanistan, the kind of actions attributed to Pakistan by the Indian media are actually inspired from their film industry. “They create stories. This is how marketing agencies work in India,” he said.