Afghanistan’s security regional countries’ shared concern: Iran envoy

The Afghan people’s security, stability and welfare are the matters of concern shared by the countries in the region, says a senior Iranian official.

Hassan Kazemi Qomi, the Iranian president’s special envoy on Afghanistan affairs, made the comment in a post on X on Sunday, following a meeting with his Russian, Chinese and Pakistani counterparts Zamir Kabulov, Yue Xiaoyong and Asif Ali Khan Durrani, respectively, in the Qatari capital, Doha.

Kazemi Qomi said the regional contact committee has played a principally effective role in the developments pertaining to Afghanistan’s security and stability.

A two-day UN-convened meeting of Special Envoys on Afghanistan started in Doha on February 18 to discuss Resolution 2679, which has to do with a “commitment to the sovereignty, independence, territorial integrity and national unity of Afghanistan.”

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres hosts the Doha session on Afghanistan, which marks the second such UN-organized gathering in less than a year. Taliban leaders are not attending the meeting as they were not invited to the session of May 2023.

In a Sunday meeting with Suhail Shaheen, the head of the Taliban political office in Doha, Kazemi Qomi said defending the people of Afghanistan is a centerpiece to Tehran’s diplomacy.

He said the peoples of the two neighboring countries have cooperated in various fields, not least religion and culture.

In another post on Saturday, the Iranian envoy said he held “explicit but very constructive” talks with the Special Representative of the European Union for Afghanistan (EUSE), Tomas Niklasson.

“If Europe wants to help the Afghan people, it should not take humanitarian aid as hostage for its regional relations,” Kazemi Qomi told the European diplomat.

MG