Afghan President Ghani Says He’ll Visit Pakistan On June 27

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Ghani

Ghani

By RFE/RL’s Radio Free Afghanistan
June 4, 2019

Afghan President Ashraf Ghani says he will visit Pakistan on June 27 in an effort to improve bilateral relations that are often hampered by mistrust and reciprocal accusations.

Ghani said on June 4 that the visit was agreed on after he met Pakistan’s Prime Minister Imran Khan last week on the sidelines of a meeting of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation in Saudi Arabia.

“I hope the visit will be positive,” Ghani said in his message to mark Eid al-Fitr, the Muslim holiday that ends the holy month of Ramadan.

Kabul has been long accused Pakistan of harboring Taliban militants who launch attacks inside Afghanistan, but Ghani said he was hopeful that years of mistrust can be replaced by mutual trust and cooperation toward peace.

Last week, Zalmay Khalilzad, the U.S. envoy seeking a peace deal with the Taliban, held talks in Islamabad with senior Pakistani officials, including Khan and army chief Qamar Javed Bajwa.

Pakistan has recently offered support to U.S. efforts to broker an end to Afghanistan’s almost 18-year-long war.

Khalilzad has held several rounds of talks with the militants in Qatar. The sides have made progress, but the Taliban has so far rejected direct negotiations with Kabul.

With reporting by AP

Copyright (c) 2019. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave NW, Ste 400, Washington DC 20036.

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Deadly Bus Blast Rattles Afghan Capital on Eve of Eid

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fireAyaz Gul
VOA News
June 3, 2019

ISLAMABAD — Officials in Afghanistan say a powerful bomb ripped through a minibus carrying government employees in Kabul Monday, killing at least five people and injuring 10 others.

The deadly attack in the capital occurred on the eve of annual Eid al-Fitr festivities that marks the end of the Islamic fasting month of Ramadan.

The violence comes as the U.S. special representative for Afghanistan reconciliation, Zalmay Khalilzad, visits the region. He is scheduled to hold a fresh round of peace talks with Qatar-based envoys of the Taliban insurgency in a bid to end Afghanistan’s 17-year- war.

An Interior Ministry spokesman, Nasrat Rahimi, said a magnetic improvised explosive device was used in the attack Monday and victims were mostly staff members at the Afghan Independent Administrative Reform and Civil Service Commission.

There were no immediate claims of responsibility.

The attack came a day after three separate bomb blasts in Kabul killed at least two people and injured 24 others. The Islamic State terrorist group claimed responsibility for those attacks, saying they caused 33 casualties among Afghan Shi’ites, journalists and security forces.

Monday’s violence came shortly after the United Nations called on Taliban insurgents and U.S.-backed Afghan security forces to cease hostilities to allow Afghans to commemorate the Eid celebration.

“I strongly urge all parties to the conflict to stop violence and to respect this time of reflection and tolerance so that everybody in Afghanistan can enjoy Eid peacefully,” said Tadamichi Yamamoto, who heads the U.N. Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA).

The Taliban and the Afghan government had both observed their own cease-fires during last year’s Eid festivities. It is not clear, however, whether the insurgent group would stop violence in response to cease-fire calls by Kabul and U.S. officials.

Afghan battlefield hostilities, as expected, have intensified during the summer fighting season. Local watchdog groups have documented more than 2,300 casualties in May, including 1,317 deaths. The victims included combatants and Afghan civilians.

The conflict-related violence has already killed around 500 combatants on both sides since the start of June, according to figures released by the Afghan Defense Ministry and the Taliban, although both often inflate battlefield claims.

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Screenshot of Taliban Spokesman’s Official Twitter Account

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