Islamabad: Defense Minister Khawaja Muhammad Asif, reacting to the failure of the talks between Pakistan and Afghanistan, said that they will not tolerate the betrayal of the Afghan Taliban any longer, if they want to fight, the world will see everything, we have the ability to push the Taliban back into caves.
After the talks between Afghanistan and Pakistan in Istanbul failed, Defense Minister Khawaja Asif warned the Afghan Taliban in strong words that if they want to test Islamabad’s resolve, they should try it ‘at their own end and ruin’.
In a post on the social networking website ‘X’, Khawaja Asif said, ‘We have tolerated your disloyalty and mockery but not anymore’.
He said that in the event of any terrorist attack or suicide bombing inside Pakistan, we will definitely give you a bitter taste of such adventures.
The Defense Minister said that Pakistan participated in the talks to give peace a chance at the request of brotherly countries, which the rulers of Kabul kept pleading with repeatedly, but the poisonous statements of some Afghan officials clearly reflect the cunning and anarchic mentality of the Taliban government.
In the post, he further wrote that ‘I want to assure them that Pakistan does not need even a minor use of its military force to completely end the Taliban pact and force them to hide in caves again’.
He wrote that ‘If the Afghan Taliban want, they can see the scenes of their escape in Tora Bora again and the people of the region will definitely like to see the state of the Afghan Taliban’s escape’.
Khawaja Asif said, “It is sad to see that the Taliban are indiscriminately pushing Afghanistan towards another conflict to maintain their usurped rule and sustain the war economy that supports them.”
He said, “Despite knowing their own limitations and the emptiness of their war slogans, they are beating the war drum to save their deteriorating image.”
He said, “If the Afghan Taliban government is insanely bent on destroying Afghanistan and its innocent people again, then what is meant to be will be.”
In his message, the Defense Minister said that as far as the narrative of “graves of empires” is concerned, Pakistan certainly does not claim to be an empire itself, but Afghanistan has never been a graveyard of empires, in fact, it is a graveyard for its own people.
He said that the war mongers within the Taliban regime, whose interests are tied to the continuation of instability in the region, should know that they may have misjudged our resolve and courage.
Khawaja Asif added that “if the Taliban regime wants to fight us, then God willing, the world will consider their threats as mere spectacle.”
Border tensions
Earlier, Federal Information Minister Attaullah Tarar announced that the latest talks between Islamabad and Kabul in Istanbul had failed.
Relations between the two countries have deteriorated further in the past few days, with border clashes, retaliatory statements and accusations.
The tensions began earlier this month when Pakistan was attacked from the Afghan border on the night of October 11, following allegations that Pakistan had carried out airstrikes in Afghanistan.
Islamabad has long demanded that the Taliban prevent terrorist groups from using its soil against Pakistan.
However, the Taliban deny the allegation that they allow terrorists to operate from Afghan soil.
Meanwhile, Pakistan continues to struggle to deal with the problem of terrorism and its security personnel have suffered numerous casualties in intelligence-based operations.
The initial clash on October 11 has been followed by several more clashes on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border, during which Islamabad has also targeted camps of the Gul Bahadur group in Afghanistan.
Eventually, the two sides came to the negotiating table in Doha, which resulted in a temporary ceasefire, and it was agreed to meet again in Istanbul to develop a mechanism for lasting peace and stability between the two countries.
However, a second round of talks between the two countries continued for three days in Istanbul, Turkey, but failed to make any progress.
Turkey, Qatar try to salvage talks
Turkish and Qatari mediators tried to salvage the talks on Tuesday, after talks between Pakistan and the Afghan Taliban briefly broke down over “irreconcilable differences.”
A Pakistani security source told reporters that the talks had failed due to “the Afghan Taliban’s lack of commitment and seriousness to resolve terrorism-related issues and their refusal to provide any written assurances.”
The Afghan side told reporters that the talks had ended inconclusively, with officials in Kabul accusing the Pakistani delegation of misbehavior and making “demands that are unacceptable to Afghanistan.”
However, the impasse was lifted within hours of the reports, with negotiators back at the table by midday, when Turkish and Qatari mediators urged both sides to sit down again as a last-ditch effort to reach at least a limited agreement.
A Pakistani official confirmed that the talks in Istanbul resumed at the insistence of the host country and other mediators, and the talks continued for a long time.
According to diplomatic sources in the Foreign Office, the Afghan Taliban delegation’s position changed several times during the four days, often due to new instructions from Kabul. They came close to an agreement four or five times, but each time new instructions from Kabul sabotaged progress.
A source familiar with the talks said that internal Taliban differences, divisions between factions based in Kandahar, Kabul and Khost, were also cited as reasons. If the Kandahar group agrees on any point, the differences of the Kabul group come to the fore.
Further complications arose when the Afghan side filed a new demand and said that Pakistan must ensure that American drones do not enter Afghan airspace through Pakistani airspace, observers pointed out the irony that many of these drones originate from Qatar, which is itself a mediator in the Istanbul talks.
Despite the latest setback, Turkish and Qatari officials worked hard to keep the process alive, warning both sides that failure of the talks could lead to a new round of border tensions.
Pakistani officials reiterated their long-standing position that no deal would be acceptable without verifiable guarantees that Afghan soil would be safe from the use of terrorism against Pakistan.
“Our position has been consistent that no deal is possible without concrete guarantees,” said a senior security source.
