khan:  Afghan Taliban FM defends PM Imran against criticism from his countrymen – Times of India

khan: Afghan Taliban FM defends PM Imran against criticism from his countrymen – Times of India

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ISLAMABAD: The acting Taliban foreign minister, Amir Khan Muttaqi, defended the latest remarks of Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan on corruption, terrorism and cultural diversity in Afghanistan, which had created an uproar in the war-torn country.
Khan had claimed during his keynote address at the OIC meeting o Sunday that Daesh has been threatening Pakistan from Afghanistan. “We have had attacks from the Afghan border, from ISIS, into Pakistan,” he had said.
Khan had stated that due to years of corruption in Afghanistan, poverty was widespread in the landlocked country even before the collapse of the former government there. He also spoke on the human rights issue, saying that it should be understood in the context of prevalent cultural values in the country.
“We must understand… when we talk about human rights, every society is different. Every society’s idea of human rights and women’s rights are different,” Khan said. “Culture in Kabul was always different from rural areas, just like we see in Peshawar where it is completely different from the districts on the border with Afghanistan,” Pakistan’s PM had said.
His remarks on ISIS and human rights drew a sharp response from former Afghan president Hamid Karzai and other Afghan nationals on social media. Karzai called Khan’s remarks “an attempt to sow discord among Afghans, and an insult to the Afghan people”.
“Allegations that ISIS is active in Afghanistan, threatening Pakistan from Afghanistan, is clear propaganda and in fact the opposite is true. The threat of ISIS has been directed from Pakistan against Afghanistan from the very onset,” Karzai said in a series of tweets.
At a presser in Kabul on Monday, the interim Afghan FM said that he believed the Pakistan PM’s remarks at OIC’s extraordinary session were not an insult to Afghanistan.
Muttaqi said Khan’s remarks were critical of the former governments and therefore the former officials felt compelled to react. “Imran Khan criticised the former (Afghan) governments. I think officials of the former governments felt obligated to react, I don’t see (Khan’s remarks) as insulting.”
Muttaqi said that if the Pakistan PM meant that a weak Afghan government would not be able to control the Daesh threat, that is another issue. “I hope it will never happen,” he added.



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