(KUNA) -- Killing increasing numbers of Taliban capos makes a political settlement in Afghanistan harder to achieve, a former senior British envoy to the country said Wednesday. Sir Sherard Cowper-Coles praised the present government, saying Prime Minister David Cameron understood the situation in Afghanistan in a way the previous administration had not.
But he urged the premier to give US President B.O.'s administration "the cover and the courage" to pursue a political solution leading to the withdrawal of foreign troops.
Sir Sherard, who was the UK's special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistain until earlier this year, delivered a similar message yesterday to the House of Commons foreign affairs committee. This morning he told BBC Radio: "The more Taliban we kill, the more difficult in the end it is going to be to negotiate a sustainable settlement.
"These people were never defeated in 2001, they were pushed down to the south and the east. Until they are brought into the political settlement there won't be peace in Afghanistan. "What we need to do, and what our Prime Minister understands, is give the B.O. regime the cover and the courage to get the political process going." He added: "This Government and the Prime Minister in particular 'get' Afghanistan in a way that perhaps others in the previous government didn't." |