By Mohammad Farshad Daryosh in TOLOnews, April 21, 2023 at 8:21 PM
The US Department of State’s deputy spokesperson Vedant Patel said that any discussion at the UN meeting about recognition of the Afghan interim government would be unacceptable to Washington.
Patel made the remarks at a press conference in response to a question about UN Deputy Secretary General Amina Mohammed’s statement about the organization planning to arrange a conference in the coming days to discuss the recognition of the Islamic Emirate.
“So my colleague at the mission in New York, the spokesperson there, spoke a little bit about this yesterday, so I would refer you to his comments,” Patel said. “But what I would reiterate, what he said from here is that the intent of – purpose of — this meeting was never to discuss recognition of the Taliban, and any discussion at this meeting about recognition would be unacceptable to us. But I will let our mission in New York speak more about this.”
Mohammed’s remarks faced reactions both from Afghans and at an international level.
Meanwhile, Farhan Haq, deputy spokesman for the UN Secretary General, said that the Doha conference which is set for May 1 and 2, “is not focusing on recognition, and we don’t want there to be any confusion about that.”
“The point of the discussion, which will be held in a closed private setting, is to build a more unified consensus on the challenges at hand,” he told the reporters. “As you know, there’s a need to reinvigorate international engagement around the sort of common objectives that the international community has on Afghanistan. And so we consider it a priority to advance an approach based on pragmatism and principles, to have a constructive engagement on the issue. So that is where we will be focusing.”
The Islamic Emirate’s spokesman said that recognition is the right of the Afghan interim government.
“There are problems in some of the countries which are due to some manners among the countries… The recent steps which have been taken create hopes that the sides might have reached satisfaction and that effective and beneficial steps would be taken in this regard,” said Zabiullah Mujahid, Islamic Emirate’s Spokesman.
The UN meeting is due to be held in Doha.
Earlier, UN Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed, speaking at an academic event in the US, said the UN plans to arrange a conference with various envoys to discuss granting recognition to the Islamic Emirate.
https://tolonews.com/afghanistan-183057
