Russia Expresses Concerns Over U.S. ‘Unrealistic’ Strategy for Afghanistan

Russia Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has expressed his concern over Washington’s new strategy on the Afghan crisis, calling it as an “unrealistic approach”.

Lavrov and U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson had a meeting on the sideline of the OSCE Ministerial Council meeting in Vienna on Thursday.

After the meeting, the Russian top diplomat stressed that his country is a little bit alarmed by the new strategy announced by Washington for Afghanistan.

He stated that the U.S. has focused on the military solution for resolving the situation in Afghanistan while Russia believe this is not realistic.

Meanwhile, Lavrov and Tillerson have reiterated the importance of further contacts on Afghanistan.

“We reiterated the usefulness of contacts on Afghanistan between our representatives,” Lavrov continued. “We had contacts in September and in December… Of course, we need to know what each of us wants.”

According to Russia Foreign Minister, Washington and Moscow have agreed to continue contacts on Afghanistan and cooperate with other countries involved in the Afghan settlement.

This comes as the U.S. new strategy for Afghanistan calls for more troops in Afghanistan, insisting that conditions on the ground would determine troop levels and strategy.

The Afghan government also emphasize on the elimination of terrorist groups which are operating in Afghanistan.

“The terrorist groups such as the Al-Qaeda, Daesh, Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ), Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), Chechens, Uyghurs, and Arab terror groups which are in Afghanistan must be destroyed, because they are coming to Afghanistan for fight and they are terrorist groups,” Defense Ministry Spokesman, Major General Dawlat Waziri said.