Pakistan needs to decide that it cannot run with the hare and hunt with the hounds

ANI NEWS

An editorial in a Pakistan newspaper has called on the Pakistan Government to stop its clandestine state patronage of the Afghan Taliban. The Express Tribune editorial said: "Pakistani state needs to decide that it cannot run with the hare and hunt with the hounds". It criticized Islamabad's current policy of allowing some jihadis safe havens so that they may be used as proxies in 'foreign policy ventures'. It claimed that such policies had never worked in the past, and were unlikely to work in future. With the failure of the negotiations in Qatar, the editorial said: "Now might be a good time to rethink our policy towards Afghanistan. The Taliban are clearly not interested in sharing power and will wage a civil war to attain absolute power". In such a scenario, we should not have that blood on our hands," it added.