MONITORING (SW) – The U.S. Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo has urged Afghan politicians to form an inclusive government.
In a series of tweets, he thanked the Afghan government for preparing an inclusive negotiating team to make intra-Afghan negotiations successful. He applaud the government’s commitment to begin releasing prisoners and to set conditions for peace and reconciliation.
“I urge you to show the same commitment to the effort to form an inclusive government. This step plus decisions already taken can help all Afghans realize a brighter future”, he tweeted.
This comes days after the U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo met the two Afghan leaders in Kabul.
"Because this leadership failure poses a direct threat to U.S. national interests, effective immediately, the U.S. government will initiate a review of the scope of our cooperation with Afghanistan", the State Department said.
"Among other steps, we are today announcing a responsible adjustment to our spending in Afghanistan and immediately reducing assistance by $1 billion this year. We are prepared to reduce by another $1 billion in 2021. We will also initiate a review of all of our programs and projects to identify additional reductions, and reconsider our pledges to future donor conferences for Afghanistan. We have made clear to the leadership that we will not back security operations that are politically motivated, nor support political leaders who order such operations or those who advocate for or support parallel government", it added.
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