India should continue to take care of Afghan people's basic interests, needs: Former foreign secretary

New Delhi [India]: As India flagged off the first consignment of humanitarian aid of 50,000 tonnes of wheat to a war-ravaged nation, Former foreign secretary Shashank on Tuesday said that Afghanistan is an important neighbour and New Delhi should continue to take care of the interest and basic needs of the Afghan people.

Talking about the current Taliban regime in Afghanistan, the Former foreign secretary told ANI that India is very disturbed with the change of events in Afghanistan and "we remain concerned that the Afghanistan-Pakistan region should not once again become spewing ground, the preparatory ground for the terrorist elements to travel around outside the Pakistan-Afghanistan region and affect India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, many other countries, Nepal etc."

"So, therefore, that remains a major interest for India. Only thing is that Indians are regarded as the best friends of Afghan people at one time. And therefore we have to continue to take care of the interest and basic needs of the Afghan people," Shashank said.

The former foreign secretary noted that India had spent about 2 billion or over USD 2 billion in Afghanistan for social infrastructure and for other infrastructure development projects, not for hurting the interest of the Afghan people. "So, we have to continue to give them food assistance and others," he said.

He also talked about the different routes via Chabahar port to reach out to Afghanistan. He said, "we have the Chahabar port agreement with Iran, which is the strategic trilateral agreement with Afghanistan, Iran and India..."

"Afghanistan is an important neighbour for us. The only issue which we have in mind is to somehow continue to give food assistance to people in Afghanistan, and to make sure that whatever connectivities we were trying to develop earlier through Afghanistan at least they are not hurt and we can have alternative connectivity routes through Chabahar port..," he added.

Earlier today, Foreign Secretary of India, Harsh V Shringla flagged off the first consignment of humanitarian aid of 50,000 tonnes of wheat to Afghanistan, in the presence of Afghanistan's Ambassador to India, Farid Mamundzay.

In a ceremony held at Amritsar, Shringla along with Mamundzay and World Food Program Country Director Bishaw Parajuli flagged off the first convoy of 50 trucks carrying 2500 MT of wheat assistance from India to Afghanistan via Pakistan. (ANI)