The Foreign Minister In The Rabbani Government Does Not Expect Much From The Bonn Inter-Afghan Conference

Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Northern Alliance Abdullah Abdullah has warned about the complexity of the process of a political settlement in Afghanistan in the post-Taliban period. Dr. Abullah said this in the interview he gave to the London Daily Telegraph on the eve of the quadripartite inter-Afghan meeting on the future political regime in the country, which is opening on Tuesday under the aegis of the United Nations in the suburbs of Bonn. "The expections from the meeting of the countries of the Western coalition are apparently too high and optimistic," said he. Explaining his thought, he added: In the south of Afghanistan the Alliance "has no partners" with whom it would be possible to form a transitory government. According to Dr. Abdullah, it is necessary to build a bridge between the Nothern Alliance and the Pashtoons among whom there are only one or two persons capble of playing such a role." He said that former King of Afghanistan Zahir Shah wanted to play this role. But "he must be more active" in this case. In the opinion of the minister, the maximum that can be expected from the meeting in the suburbs of Bonn is the elaboration of the principles of forming a transitory government with which all the participants in the meeting will agree, but not the formation of the government itself.