Afghan, Pakistani presidents meet in Turkey

The Afghan and Pakistani leaders will attend a trilateral meeting to be chaired by Turkish President Abdullah Gul at Cankaya Palace at 2:00 p.m. (1100 GMT).

After holding bilateral talks with Gul separately, Karzai and Zardari met Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan.

Wednesday's meeting, the third round of fence-mending talks between the two troubled neighbors in Ankara since 2007, will also be attended by the foreign ministers, army chiefs and intelligence chiefs from the three countries.

The Turkish-sponsored talks come one day after more than 70 nations met in the Hague, Netherlands, to reinvigorate international efforts to stabilize Afghanistan and Pakistan’s lawless western region.

Afghanistan says much of its insurgent violence is planned in Pakistan, and, along with the United States, has accused its neighbor of not doing enough to stop militants crossing the border.

Pakistan rejects those accusations and says more than 1,500 of its troops have been killed at the hands of Islamist extremists since 2002.

Pakistan’s northwestern tribal regions have become a safe haven for extremists who fled Afghanistan after the U.S.-led invasion toppled the hardline Taliban regime in late 2001.

The United States is sending 21,000 additional forces to bolster the record 38,000 American troops already in the country in an attempt to tamp down an increasingly bloody Taliban insurgency.

Drawing on its traditionally close ties with both Afghanistan and Pakistan, Turkey is seeking to encourage and consolidate the recently improved relations between the two.

Turkey shares the view of the United States and several other western powers that peace in Afghanistan hinges on combining the battle against extremists with reconstruction and development efforts, a Turkish diplomat told AFP Tuesday.

Photo: AA