Pakistan fully supports Afghan-led peace initiative

ISLAMABAD: Speaker National Assembly Asad Qaiser Sunday said Pakistan fully supported an Afghan-led and Afghan-owned peace initiative.

“A peaceful Afghanistan is in the best interest of Pakistan and the region. The people of Afghanistan and Pakistan regardless of ethnicities are bound together by everlasting cultural, religious and historic affinities,” he said in an interview with the state television.

Asad said the visit of Chairman of the High Council for National Reconciliation Dr. Abdullah Abdullah to Pakistan would be a milestone in cementing Pak-Afghan relations. He said regular engagement at political and functionaries level had foiled foreign attempts to disrupt relations between Pakistan and Afghanistan.

He said parliamentary interaction would further augment those relations. Referring to the foreign aggression on Afghanistan three decades ago, Asad said Pakistanis wholeheartedly welcomed their Afghan brethren.

He said with the advent of peace in Afghanistan, the Government of Pakistan would further facilitate the voluntary repatriation of Afghan refugees to their homeland.