Afghanistan and EU Council

Andrew Stephenson Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd July 2013 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his comments. One of the advantages of getting in there early as the first Prime Minister to go and meet Prime Minister Sharif is that we can have that sort of dialogue. We have a full strategic partnership with Pakistan and a national security dialogue, so all these issues can be raised.

[Andrew Stephenson (Pendle) (Con)]

I congratulate the Prime Minister on being the first western leader to visit Nawaz Sharif following his election and the first peaceful and democratic transition of power in Pakistan since its independence in 1947. A lasting stable peace in Afghanistan cannot be achieved without the involvement of Pakistan, but trade, energy, relations with India and a whole range of other issues will be higher up Prime Minister Sharif’s agenda. What can our Prime Minister do to ensure that momentum on Afghanistan-Pakistan relations is not lost?

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. This democratic transition is an incredible moment for Pakistan, and I believe that it should use it as a moment to get the world to look afresh at this remarkable country, which has an enormous population and great economic prospects for the future if it makes the tough and necessary decisions. We must accept that Prime Minister Sharif has many priorities. He needs to deal with energy shortages, to get his economy on track and to deal with extremism. It is in dealing with that last element where we need to work together to demonstrate that the extremism suffered in Pakistan cannot be addressed without addressing the extremism from which Afghans are suffering, too. If we can try to achieve joint working between the President and the Prime Minister and the two Governments, that is the key.