India attends Intra-Afghan talks, bats for peace process must be Afghan-led

India attended the intra-Afghan talks in Doha, where External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar joined-in virtually and asserted that the peace process must be Afghan-led, Afghan-owned, and Afghan-controlled. He further stated that India's friendship with Afghanistan is strong and unshaken and that both countries have been good neighbours and will always be so.

New Delhi: India on Saturday attended the start of the intra-Afghan talks in Doha where External Affairs minister S Jaishankar joined-in virtually.

During the address, Jaishankar said that the peace process must be Afghan-led, Afghan-owned and Afghan-controlled.

“Addressed the conference on Afghan peace negotiations at Doha today. Conveyed that the peace process must be Afghan-led, Afghan-owned and Afghan-controlled, respect national sovereignty and territorial integrity of Afghanistan, promote human rights and democracy, ensure the interest of minorities, women and the vulnerable, effectively address violence across the country”, Jaishankar tweeted.

Our expectation is that the soil of Afghanistan should never be used for any anti-India activities”, he added.

Further, he said, “The friendship of our people is a testimony to our history with Afghanistan. No part of Afghanistan is untouched by our 400-plus development projects. I am confident that this civilizational relationship will continue to grow.

The minister also stressed that India has been a major development partner of Afghanistan and said that India has supplied more than a million tons of foodgrains to the war-torn country in recent years.

The EAM said that India’s friendship with Afghanistan is strong and unshaken and that both the countries have been good neighbours and will always be so.

According to reports, Joint Secretary (Pakistan-Afghanistan-Iran) in Ministry of External Affairs, JP Singh, in Doha witnessed the event. Singh, who has served in Afghanistan as First Secretary (political) and Pakistan as Deputy High Commissioner, is the government’s point person on India’s ties with three countries-Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iran.

It is worth noting that India had attended the signing of the US-Taliban pact on February 29. At that point, Indian ambassador to Qatar P Kumaran had witnessed the event.

In fact, India is Afghanistan’s major development partner and has built a number of infrastructure projects in the country like India Afghanistan friendship dam in the western province of Heart and the Afghan Parliament in capital Kabul.

Earlier this week, Jaishankar had visited Iran and had discussed the situation in Afghanistan.

Two days after Defence Minister Rajnath Singh met his counterpart in Iran, the EAM had on Tuesday while on his way to Moscow for SCO meet, made a technical halt in Tehran and met Iranian Foreign minister Javad Zarif and discussed the Chabahar port project and the situation in Afghanistan.

Such back to back high-level ministerial visits from India to Iran shows India’s commitment to ties with Tehran at a difficult time like this.

The Kabul government and the Taliban opened the peace talks earlier in the day in Doha which is aimed at establishing peace and stability in Afghanistan, in the presence of US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.

Both the sides discussed constitutional changes and power-sharing.

The talk in Doha brings together negotiators appointed by the Afghan government and the Taliban’s 21-member delegation.

The 21 member team was led by Mawlavi Abdul Hakim, the armed group’s chief justice and a close aide of the group's chief Haibatullah Akhunzada.

According to the agreement, the Afghan government said that it will release 5,000 Taliban prisoners while the Taliban agreed to release 1,000 Afghan troops.