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Asia and the Pacific
00:32 GMT 19.06.2021 (updated 00:50 GMT 19.06.2021) Get short URL
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Sputnik International
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Morgan Artyukhina. Sputnik International
https://sputniknews.com/asia/202106191083187048-absolutely-not-imran-khan-swats-down-cia-request-to-use-pakistani-bases-for-afghanistan-ops/
The Pentagon and the U.S. State Department have pursued former Soviet republics to Afghanistan north as places to continue operations after the withdrawal in September 2021, but have so far had little success given their proximity and ties to the Russian Federation.
Pakistani President Imran Khan told Axios in an interview to be broadcast on Sunday that the CIA will definitely not be allowed to operate from Pakistani soil after the United States completed its withdrawal from Afghanistan later this year.
The US loss is not for lack of attempts: CIA Director William Burns and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin have both visited Pakistan in recent months to discuss continued cooperation. However, the Pakistani government, long close to the Taliban, against which the United States would likely operate, has rejected all attempts as a compromise.
Pakistan’s Inter-Service-Intelligence (ISI) agency was Washington’s gateway to Afghanistan for decades before the US-led invasion in October 2001, providing a way for the United States to withdraw financial and material support for Afghan tribesmen fighting the Afghan socialist government and its Soviet allies in the 1980s, including those who later became the Taliban, and then to groups opposed to the Taliban government that came to power after the Socialist government collapsed in 1996.
According to the New York Times, the United States is once again seeking clerks in Afghanistan for support after the last US forces leave on September 11, apparently reflecting a belief that the Taliban, now without power, will not take peace talks seriously and that the the US-backed Afghan government will quickly collapse in the face of a renewed Taliban offensive.
While the United States and the Taliban in February 2020 reached a peace agreement that the United States should end its 20-year occupation of the country and remove its remaining soldiers, a similar agreement between the Taliban and the Afghan government has proved more elusive.
However, while Islamabad will no longer cooperate with the United States, Afghan President Ashraf Ghani has signaled that his administration may seek their help in achieving stability without the United States.
Peace will be decided primarily regionally, and I think we are at a crucial moment to reconsider. It is first and foremost a matter of getting Pakistan on board, Ghani told Der Spiegel last month. The United States now plays only a minor role. The issue of peace or hostility is now in Pakistani hands.
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