ISLAMABAD: The Foreign Office on Friday clarified that the government of Pakistan is not hosting the forthcoming dialogue of Afghan personalities scheduled in Islamabad next week, saying the event is being organised independently by a think tank.
Afghans — mostly living in exile and critical of the Taliban — are expected to gather in Islamabad on Aug 25-26 to deliberate on the situation in their country. The South Asian Strategic Stability Institute (SASSI) University will host the first session on Aug 25, followed by a dialogue with Pakistanis on Aug 26, according to SASSI chairperson Dr Maria Sultan.
Speaking at the weekly media briefing, FO spokesperson Shafqat Ali Khan stressed: “It is a think tank activity and not state-sponsored. The government of Pakistan is not hosting this conference.” He added that participants had been invited by the organisers, received visas, and would attend openly.
“This has been somewhat sensationalised by certain social media posts,” he remarked, in an apparent reference to former US envoy Zalmay Khalilzad’s call for a boycott of the dialogue.
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The event, the first of its kind in Pakistan since the Taliban takeover in 2021, has drawn criticism from Kabul. Afghan Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi, in his Independence Day address on Aug 19, appeared to take aim at the planned gathering.
Over 30 Afghans, many of them women’s rights activists, have been invited. Former Afghan MP Fawzia Kofi rebuked Mr Khalilzad’s criticism, writing on X that rather than trying to undermine one of the few spaces still available to Afghan women, he should be included in the talks.
SASSI chairperson Dr Sultan subsequently extended an invitation to Mr Khalilzad on social media.
