The Irish Times
February 9, 2002
PAKISTAN/AFGHANISTAN: The Pakistani President, Gen Pervez Musharraf, and the Afghan interim leader, Mr Hamid Karzai, agreed yesterday that their two countries should develop "mutual brotherly relations" and co-operate "in all spheres of activity" - including a proposed gas pipeline from Central Asia to Pakistan via Afghanistan.
"We have agreed unanimously ... on working together to develop strong brotherly co-operation, brotherly relations between Afghanistan and Pakistan in all spheres of activity," Gen Musharraf said after their talks.
Gen Musharraf said Pakistan will provide $10 million to the Afghan interim government to pay for government outlays. About 200,000 employees of the Afghan government have not been paid a salary for over six months by the ousted Taliban, and the interim Afghan government has maintained that paying them was the most urgent government priority.
Mr Karzai, who arrived in Islamabad earlier yesterday for a one-day visit, said he and Gen Musharraf discussed the proposed Central Asian gas pipeline project "and agreed that it was in the interest of both countries". Pakistan and several multinational companies, including the California-based Unocal Corp and Bridas S.A. of Argentina, have been toying with the idea of constructing a 1,600-km pipeline from Turkmenistan through Afghanistan to growing natural gas markets in Pakistan and, potentially, India. But the project has failed to materialise because of the civil war in Afghanistan and the reluctance of the financial institutions to finance it.
Gen Musharraf said he told Mr Karzai that Pakistan and Afghanistan are bound together by common geography, faith, history and culture.
"Pakistan is extremely interested in having a peaceful, stable, united, progressive Afghanistan as its brotherly neighbour because it does not only serve the purpose of peace in the region but it also serves the economic interest of this entire region," he said.
Mr Karzai said he and Gen Musharraf "look forward to a tremendously good future. That future can be made certain by respecting each other's territorial integrity and freedom," he said, adding that he was grateful to Gen Musharraf "for wishing the Afghan people the unity, the independence, the progress that Afghans so badly need."
The two leaders also discussed the repatriation of over two million Afghan refugees living in Pakistan since the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979. Mr Karzai thanked Pakistan for having given "a tremendous welcome" to Afghan refugees. "But they have a home to go to, and that home is Afghanistan.
"We would be grateful if our brothers in Pakistan allowed us time to prepare for that, so that our refugees can return home in tranquillity and dignity," he said.
Meanwhile police hunting a former English public schoolboy suspected of kidnapping an American reporter have recovered e-mails from another suspect's computer.
Investigators had hoped to rescue Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl before Gen Musharraf left last night for talks with President Bush in Washington.
© Copyright 2002
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