US urges Pakistan, Afghanistan to cooperate to defeat extremism

The United States is calling on both Afghanistan and Pakistan to work together to defeat violent extremism, hoping recent Taliban attacks will not set back efforts aimed at promoting Afghan peace and reconciliation.  State Department spokesman John Kirby told reporters that Washington does not have “specific intelligence” to conclude whether Pakistan was involved in recent […]

The United States is calling on both Afghanistan and Pakistan to work together to defeat violent extremism, hoping recent Taliban attacks will not set back efforts aimed at promoting Afghan peace and reconciliation. 
State Department spokesman John Kirby told reporters that Washington does not have “specific intelligence” to conclude whether Pakistan was involved in recent deadly attacks on the Afghan side of the border. 
He was speaking just hours after Afghan President Ashraf Ghani directly blamed Pakistan for being behind the weekend and Monday’s suicide bombings in Kabul.  
“It is in the urgent interest of both countries to eliminate safe havens and to reduce the operational capacity of the Taliban on both sides of the border,” Kirby said. 
He added Washington hopes the insurgent violence would not derail efforts aimed at seeking an end to the Afghan conflict through peaceful negotiations. 
“We certainly want to see a political reconciliation process move forward. We want to see peace. And recent participation in those reconciliation talks as of a few weeks ago was certainly an encouraging sign… we want to see this progress,” Kirby said.