THE SAARC foreign ministers’ meeting, which was planned to be persisted the sidelines of the UN General Assembly session in ny in the week , has been called off over Afghanistan’s participation.
Sources said Pakistan wanted to stay an “empty chair”, and was against the participation of representatives from the previous Ashraf Ghani regime. consistent with sources, if the meeting was held, a representative from Afghanistan’s mission at the UN in ny could have attended it.
Pakistan is learnt to possess proposed that a Taliban representative should even be a part of the meeting. The proposal was shot down by the remaining members. This was in sight of the very fact that the new Taliban regime has not yet been recognised by governments across the planet , and that they have also not approached the UN for credentials.
There was, however, no agreement on this issue among the SAARC members. Sources said this “lack of consensus” led to the cancellation of the SAARC foreign ministers’ meeting.
Nepal’s foreign ministry on Tuesday sent a letter to the SAARC secretariat, saying that “due to the shortage of concurrence from all member states as of today, the informal meeting of the SAARC council of ministers proposed to be held face to face on September 25 on the sidelines of the 76th UN General Assembly session won’t happen .”
Afghanistan is that the youngest member state of SAARC, having joined in 2007. India, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Nepal, Maldives, Sri Lanka and Pakistan are a part of the group. The SAARC Secretariat was found out in Kathmandu on January 17, 1987.