In a webinar held in Tehran office of Afghan Voice Agency (AVA) to discuss the role of Iran and the US in Afghan peace process, the participants stressed that the US role is destructive and just to serve Trump Administration's election campaign.
The participants said with consensus that the US is present in Afghanistan just for its own regional aims and not to help the Afghan people.
Isa Hosseini said that Iran has always been seeking peace in Afghanistan and has a positive and constructive role in Afghanistan’s peace process, adding that peace in Afghanistan means peace in Iran.
He added that if the US really wants peace in Afghanistan, it should prepare the ground for Iran’s participation in the peace process.
Former Iranian ambassador to Afghanistan and Italy Abolfazl Zohrevand said that Iran has been focusing on issues of Afghanistan over the past 30 years and has announced that everything should be decided by the Afghan people themselves and others should just pave the way, adding that US has had no achievements in the past two decades in this regard.
He said that as shown in history, Iran and Afghanistan are like one soul in two bodies and the US doesn’t want this.
Zohrevand said that Taliban as the ones who destroyed Afghanistan and the US as ones who attacked the country have now made an agreement, and now they want the Afghan government to negotiate in Doha, adding that it is not peace talks; it is the process to destroy and disintegrate Afghanistan.
Mohammad-Esmaeel Qasemyar said in the webinar that Taliban regime was destroyed in the one-month invasion of the US but changed into a big force in the presence of the US and NATO forces.
He criticized the Taliban for being happy with the agreement they made with the US, but they are still killing their fellow countrymen.
Jafar Haghpanah, assistant professor for regional studies and the head of Desk for Afghanistan Studies in the Association of Political Sciences of Iran, said Doha talks suffer a structural deficiency – lack of coordination in the three domestic, regional, and international levels.
He added that others have not allowed Tehran to have its own initiative in Afghanistan peace talks while Iran has the ability to bring together a large number of Afghan people and parties, and advantage that the US, Pakistan, and others do not have such an ability.
Talks between the Afghan government and the Taliban started in Doha on September 12 and have been going on with no progress. It is believed by Afghan analysts that the talks have reached an impasse.
Translated by: Hossein Abolqassemi
Edited by: Safar Sarabi
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