Troop timetable proposals put pressure on Pakistan

Press, 5 March 1988, Page 11

Troop timetable proposals put pressure on Pakistan

I ' I NZPA-Reuter Geneva Afghanistan has put forward proposals on a Soviet troop withdrawal that appear to meet most Western and Pakistani demands. putting pressure on | Pakistan - to sign a : United Nations-sponsbred pea.ce agreement. Afghanistan! and Pakistan; appeared far apart,' however, on the issue of a new Afghan Government to ! replace the present Soviet-backed Administration. The Afghan Foreign Minister, Abdul told a news conference as he announced the with-; drawal schedule: “From our side the agreement could be regarder as finalised.” the Pakistani Minister of State for Foreign Af-

lairs, Zain Noorani, said 1 his country was not in- ' terested in a partial settle- * ment. I ■ 5 IHe urged the United j Nations mediator, Diego ] Cordovez, to do more to | help negotiate the forma- ■ tion of a Government pal- (

atable to five million Afghan refugees. , "It’s a qestion of persuading Mr Cordovez to do something about getting active on the second track once again... so that a transitional, broadbased interim Government can be brought about in Afghanistan,” Mr Noorani told reporters. The Afghan proposal at yesterday’s talks went slightly further, than the offer of the Russian leader, Mikhail Gor-

bechev, to withdraw the estimated 115,000 Soviet troops in 10 months. ; Mr Wakil said Moscow was now offering to pull its troops out in nine months, half of them in the first three months, and that he now considered all four points of the United Nations plan to be completed. "They have put the Americans and the Pakistanis in a box,” one diplomat commented. Afghan rebels refuse to negotiate with the present Kabul Government. United States-biicked Pakistan, ally and host to the guerrillas, has agreed ito negotiate indirectly with it to try to help end the w;ar on its border and get some five million refugees to return ho,me.j