November 16, 2020
Pakistan’s Prime Minister-Imran Khan is about to set on his first ever visit to Afghanistan, since resumption of office in 2018. The visit that would take place within the next week, comes upon invitation from Afghan President Ashraf Ghani. During his visit, the PM would meet Ghani and also the Head of Afghan High Council for National Reconciliation (HCNR), Abdullah Abdullah.
The stint comes as the Afghan peace process in Doha, is witnessing snail-paced progress with an incessant violence across Afghanistan. The situation got further complicated with the election of Joe Biden to the White House, as it spells new uncertainties for the future of peace process. However, these uncertainties are not only because of the incoming Biden administration, but more so due to outgoing Trump administration’s re-energized calls for the hastened troops withdrawal, from Afghanistan.
On its part, Islamabad has played a key role, first in bringing the Taliban to negotiating table, which culminated in Doha agreement of February 2020. This was followed by the ongoing peace talks between Afghan government and Taliban. Meanwhile, Pakistan and Afghanistan have been making renewed efforts to boost up their bilateral ties, augmented with the appointment of Premier’s Special Envoy to Afghanistan, former Ambassador Mohammad Sadiq. These efforts resulted in the opening up of various border crossings between the two countries, apart from Torkham and Chaman and also brought with it Islamabad’s new liberal visa regime for Kabul. Besides that, Pakistan is also offering scholarships to Afghan youth including exclusive scholarship for females.
While both countries are cozying to each other lately; the development is also opening new ways of structural relationship between the sides on institutional level. This was reflected in the recently held Pakistan-Afghanistan Trade and Investment Forum (2020), spearheaded by Speaker National Assembly of Pakistan, Asad Qaiser. Scores of Afghan traders participated and both sides formulated a long list policy proposal as a road map to ease of doing business across the border. Along with policy proposals, the conference also generated an air of increased confidence between Kabul and Islamabad.
It is hoped that despite of the mist of uncertainties, shrouding the Afghan peace process, the up-coming visit by Imran Khan, would reinforce Islamabad’s stance of Afghan owned-Afghan led peace process along with boosting up the bilateral ties between the two states.
The author Tooba Altaf is an International Relations graduate while working as a Researcher at the Center for Research and Security Studies, Islamabad(CRSS).
© Center for Research and Security Studies (CRSS) and Afghan Studies Center (ASC), Islamabad.
