As Muttaqi hopes for stronger India ties, Pak summons Afghan envoy over J-K statement

Afghan Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi on Saturday (October 11) expressed confidence that the India-Afghanistan ties will grow stronger in future as he visited Darul Uloom Deoband in Saharanpur, one of the most influential Islamic seminaries in South Asia.

“I am thankful for such a grand welcome and the affection shown by the people here. I hope that India-Afghanistan ties advance further,” the Afghan leader told reporters as he was greeted by Mohtamim (vice-chancellor) of Darul Uloom Deoband Abul Qasim Nomani, president of Jamiat Ulama-e-Hind Maulana Arshad Madani and officials of Darul Uloom, amid a floral shower.

Muttaqi, who landed in New Delhi on Thursday on a six-day trip, is the first senior Taliban minister to visit India after the group seized power four years back. India has not yet recognised the Taliban set up.

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Muttaqi hopes for stronger ties with India

Hundreds of students of the Islamic seminary and a large number of locals who had gathered at the Deoband campus jostled to shake hands with the visiting foreign dignitary, but were stopped by security personnel.

“We will be sending new diplomats, and I hope you people will visit Kabul as well. I have hopes for stronger ties in the future from the way I was received in Delhi. These visits may be frequent in the near future,” said Muttaqi.

The Afghan foreign minister’s visit to India has assumed greater significance as it has come at a time when both India and Afghanistan are having frosty relations with Pakistan over a range of issues, including cross-border terrorism.

Pakistan summons envoy

Even as Muttaqi was visiting the seminary on Saturday, Pakistan summoned the Afghan ambassador to convey its “strong reservations” over the India-Afghanistan joint statement issued in New Delhi a day earlier.

The Foreign Office (FO) said in a statement that the Additional Foreign Secretary (West Asia and Afghanistan) conveyed Pakistan’s “strong reservations” to the Afghan envoy regarding references made to Jammu and Kashmir in the joint statement.

“It was conveyed that the reference to Jammu and Kashmir as part of India is in clear violation of the relevant UN Security Council resolutions...,” the Foreign Office said.

Also read: ‘Enough is enough’: Pakistan warns Taliban regime over cross-border terror

Islamabad rejects Muttaqi’s statement

According to the joint statement, Afghanistan has strongly condemned the terrorist attack in Pahalgam in Jammu and Kashmir in April and expressed condolences and solidarity with the people and the government of India.

Both sides unequivocally condemned all acts of terrorism emanating from regional countries as they underscored the importance of promoting peace, stability, and mutual trust in the region.

Islamabad also rejected Muttaqi’s assertion that terrorism is an internal issue of Pakistan.

The statement emphasised that shifting responsibility for controlling terrorism to Pakistan could not absolve the Afghan Interim Government of its obligations to ensure regional peace and stability.

Pakistan reminds Afghanistan of hospitality

Highlighting Pakistan’s long-standing hospitality, the FO said the country had hosted nearly four million Afghans for over four decades. With peace returning to Afghanistan, Pakistan reiterated that unauthorised Afghan nationals residing in the country should return home.

“Like all other countries, Pakistan has the right to regulate the presence of foreign nationals residing inside its territory,” it said, adding that Islamabad continued to issue medical and study visas to Afghan citizens “in the spirit of Islamic brotherhood and good neighbourly relations”.

The FO said Pakistan is desirous of seeing a peaceful, stable, regionally connected and prosperous Afghanistan.

Also read: Afghan min seeks better ties with India, Pak: ‘Courage of Afghans shouldn’t be tested’

No use of territory by undesirable elements

Reaffirming its desire for a peaceful, stable, and prosperous Afghanistan, the FO said Pakistan had extended trade, economic, and connectivity facilitation to promote socio-economic cooperation between the two nations.

However, it stressed that Pakistan also had a duty to ensure the safety of its people and expected the Afghan government to take “concrete measures” to prevent its territory from being used by terrorist elements against Pakistan.

Similarly, Muttaqi had said on Friday that the Taliban would not allow anyone to use Afghan soil against other countries, adding that Kabul would soon send its diplomats to India as part of “step-by-step” efforts to improve bilateral relations.

Muttaqi also pitched for India and Afghanistan joining hands to remove obstacles for the development of the Chabahar port in Iran in view of the Trump administration bringing it under sanctions.

Controversy over women journalists

Amid these developments, a major controversy cropper up over the absence of women journalists from Muttaqi’s presser in New Delhi on Friday, but the Deoband maintained that there were no restrictions from any side on women journalists covering its events on Saturday.

“There were no restrictions from the Afghan foreign minister’s office about who would attend,” Deoband PRO Ashraf Usmani, also the media in-charge of Muttaqi’s programme, told PTI, and dismissed as “baseless” claims that women journalists were kept away.

Also read: India had 'no role' in barring women journalists in Mattaqi's presser: MEA

Event called off due to overcrowding

The clarification came regarding a public event of the Afghanistan minister that was scheduled to be held during his visit to the Darul Uloom Deoband in Saharanpur on Saturday but was called off at the last moment due to “overcrowding” and “security reasons”.

“There were no directives from anywhere on the attendance of women journalists,” Usmani told news agency PTI. “More people turned up for the event than were expected. So, the Afghanistan minister’s speech didn’t happen as the local administration cited security concerns as a reason for cancelling the public event,” he said.

“Though the programme was called off due to overcrowding, the presence of a couple of women journalists for the Afghanistan minister’s event was enough to rebut reports of women journalists being made to keep away from the event,” he said, even naming news channels those journalists represented.

(With agency inputs)