'Pakistan Harbouring Taliban, Needs To Line Up': US State Secy Antony Blinken

Blinken said that Pakistan should uphold the international community's expectations from the Taliban government.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken.

(Photo Courtesy: Twitter/SecBlinken)

United States (US) Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Monday, 13 September, said that Pakistan should align with the international community and uphold the community's expectations from the recently-instated Taliban government in Afghanistan.

"What we have to look at is an insistence that every country, to include Pakistan, make good on the expectations that the international community has of what is required of a Taliban-led government if it's to receive any legitimacy of any kind or any support."

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken as quoted by news agency AFP

"So Pakistan needs to line up with a broad majority of the international community in working toward those ends and in upholding those expectations," he observed.

Speaking at the first public hearing in Congress about the situation in Afghanistan, Blinken told the House Foreign Affairs Committee that some of Pakistan's interests have been in conflict with those of the US's:

"It is one that is involved hedging its bets constantly about the future of Afghanistan, it's one that's involved harboring members of the Taliban... It is one that's also involved in different points cooperation with us on counterterrorism."

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken as quoted by news agency Reuters

Blinken further indicated that the US will be reassessing its equation with Pakistan in the weeks to come.

"This is one of the things we're going to be looking at in the days, and weeks ahead – the role that Pakistan has played over the last 20 years but also the role we would want to see it play in the coming years and what it will take for it to do that," he stated, Reuters reported.

(With inputs from AFP and Reuters.)