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AT Monitoring Desk-KABUL: Washington has called on Kabul and Islamabad to work together and put their utmost efforts in a bid to overcome challenges posed by the Taliban, the White House said a day after when four militants stormed Bacha Khan University in Charsadda district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, leaving 21 dead, mostly students, and left scores other wounded.
On the same day, the Taliban targeted a minibus of a private TV channel in Kabul.
“The conclusion that we’ve drawn here is…that the Taliban poses a security threat to both countries, and that the nations of Afghanistan and Pakistan are going to be able to more effectively confront that threat if they’re able to more effectively cooperate,” White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest told newsmen the other day.
He assured of his country’s support for the peace and reconciliation drive between Afghan government and the Taliban. “US has long been supportive of the peace process,” he added.
He said that US is looking to facilitate better cooperation between the two South Asian neighbors, refereeing to relations between Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Hinting to his country’s support, he said that US Vice President Joe Biden held a trilateral meeting with Afghan President Ashraf Ghani and Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in Davos in order to discuss the recent peace efforts.
During the meeting, Biden reiterated support not only in reconciliation process, but also to support Afghanistan and Pakistan for improving their bilateral ties.
“Any sort of decisions about how the continuation of those talks and any sort of agreement that could be produced by those talks about whether or not that’s in the interest of those countries to pursue— those are decisions that will be made by the leaders in those two countries, as it should be,” he said.
Representatives of Afghanistan, Pakistan, the Unite States and China in the second round of quadrilateral meeting held in Kabul had lend support for the Afghan-owned and Afghan-led peace talks.
On Wednesday, heavily-armed Taliban militants stormed the Bacha Khan University, at least 21 people were killed and more than 50 others received injures in the attack. The attack took place at a time when the university students and teachers were busy in preparation to commemorate the death anniversary of Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, also known as Bacha Khan, after whom the varsity is named. Security analysts believe that it was attack on the belief of nonviolence as the militants had deliberately targeted it to give the message of violence.
