United States President Donald Trump said on Sunday he would get the conflict between Pakistan and Afghanistan solved “very quickly”, calling Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and Chief of Army Staff (COAS) Field Marshal Asim Munir “great people”.
Trump made the remarks while addressing the signing ceremony of a Thailand-Cambodia peace deal on the sidelines of the ASEAN Summit in Kuala Lumpur.
The border clashes between Pakistan and Afghanistan were triggered after Islamabad demanded that Kabul control militants who attack Pakistan across their shared border, saying they operated from havens in Afghanistan.
A ceasefire was agreed in talks hosted by Qatar and Turkey.
On Saturday, Pakistan’s Foreign Office said the second round of talks between Pakistan and the Afghan Taliban authorities was currently underway in Istanbul, Türkiye, aimed at advancing the points agreed upon during the Doha ceasefire agreement earlier this month.
Addressing the signing ceremony of the Thailand-Cambodia peace deal, Trump said: “I heard that Pakistan and Afghanistan have started up. But I’ll get that solved very quickly. I know them both. And the Field Marshal, and the Prime Minister are great people, and I have no doubt we’re going to get that done quickly.”
“I can’t think of any [US] president who ever solved one war. They start wars. They don’t solve them,” he added.
Border closures between Pakistan and Afghanistan have pushed up prices of essential goods in both nations, with tomatoes now costing five times more in Pakistan since fighting broke out between the two South Asian neighbours this month.
Border crossings between the two countries have remained closed since October 11, following ground fighting and Pakistani airstrikes across their contested 2,600-km (1,600-mile) frontier that killed dozens on both sides in the worst fighting since the Taliban’s 2021 takeover of Kabul.
All trade and transit have been blocked since the fighting erupted, Khan Jan Alokozay, the head of the Pak-Afghan Chamber of Commerce in Kabul, told Reuters earlier this week.
“With each passing day, both sides are losing around $1 million,” he said.
Fresh fruit, vegetables, minerals, medicine, wheat, rice, sugar, meat and dairy products make up most of the $2.3 billion annual trade volume between the two countries.
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