Obama to host Afghan, Pakistan summit

US President Barack Obama will host a summit with his Afghan and Pakistani counterparts on Wednesday, the White House said, amid growing US concern over the deteriorating situation in the region.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai and Pakistani leader Asif Ali Zardari will also hold separate talks with Obama as well as a mini-summit, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said Friday.

“The president looks forward to discussing with these two democratically elected leaders how we can work together to enhance our cooperation in this important part of the world as the United States implements a new strategy” for Afghanistan and Pakistan, said Gibbs.

Obama has put nuclear-armed Pakistan, a key regional US ally, at the center of the fight against Al-Qaeda as Washington dispatches 4,000 more troops, in addition to an extra 17,000 already committed, to Afghanistan.

The plan, unveiled in March, includes a focus on flushing out Al-Qaeda sanctuaries in Pakistan and boosting civilian efforts to build up both Afghanistan and Pakistan, notably in agriculture and education.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said top officials from both countries would be in Washington for the Wednesday visit, but did not say whether they would include her counterparts Shah Mehmood Qureshi of Pakistan and Rangeen Dadfar Spanta of Afghanistan. Clinton held three-way talks with the two foreign ministers here in February.

The trilateral format is “quite helpful at beginning to change mindsets and, frankly, set forth some requirements about what we expect from these governments,” Clinton said.

“We’ll have some very intense sessions on the specifics of what we’re trying to accomplish,” the chief US diplomat said about next week’s talks.

“We think that there are a number of important missions in Afghanistan, but we can only do a few. And we have to count on our allies and partners to do others,” she said.

“Obviously, we’re taking the lead on security and stability operations, from the training of the Afghanistan National Army and police,” she said.

“We need to learn from the lessons that were painfully taught us in Iraq. We need to better integrate our military and civilian assets and approach,” Clinton added.

“In Afghanistan, we actually have quite a bit of support from the international community, both in terms of military and civilian personnel and in contributions,” she said.

AFP