The proposed conference on peace in Afghanistan has been postponed until after Eid-ul-Fitr, announced the Turkish ministry of foreign affairs on Wednesday.
A ministry tweet quoted Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu as saying that the Istanbul conference has been postponed after consultation with Qatar, the US and the UN.
The conference was scheduled to begin on April 24 in Turkish city Istanbul. The conference was earlier planned for April 14 but the Taliban backed out saying they needed time to prepare for the meeting.
The foreign minister had earlier told a news channel that “we thought that it would be beneficial to postpone it …We consulted Qatar, the US and the UN and decided to hold it after Ramadan and Eid festivities.”
There is “no need to hurry” after the recent decision by the US to withdraw its troops, he added.
“The conference would be meaningless without the Taliban joining. At the moment, we decided to postpone it since there is no clarity about the formation of the delegations and participation…The aim is not to initiate alternative talks to Doha but to contribute to the process. Hosting the meeting together in Istanbul will be Turkey, Qatar and the UN,” Foreign Minister Cavusoglu maintained.
He underlined that Turkey made efforts to conduct the meeting before May 1 as US forces were initially supposed to be completely withdrawn from Afghanistan by that day.
