As death of US special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Charles Albert Holbrooke is being mourned by world leaders, Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi said that his sudden passing away left a huge 'vacuum'. Holbrooke, 69, died on Monday after undergoing surgery for the repair of a torn aorta. He fell ill last Friday, collapsing during a meeting with the secretary of state, Hillary Clinton.
Known for his role in bringing peace to the Balkans, as the chief architect of the General Framework Agreement for Peace in Bosnia and Herzegovina, also known as Dayton Peace Accords 1995, the top-ranking American diplomat, was the only person to have held the position of Assistant Secretary of State for two different regions of the world (Asia from 1977 to 1981 and Europe from 1994 to 1996).
As a special US envoy in the current Afghan conflict, he was assigned a daunting task: make Kabul and Islamabad work together against resurgent al Qaeda and Taliban militants in Afghanistan and Pakistan. The death, just days before the Obama administration was scheduled to announce the latest review of US policy in Afghanistan, is considered a major blow to the administration since Holbooke was a key member of the team.
The report/review is due to discuss what progress has been made since deployment of 30,000 extra forces in Afghanistan last year by the Obama administration in a bid to start US troop withdrawal in July 2011. In Obama's Wars, a recent book by the journalist Bob Woodward that focuses on administration rifts over Afghanistan, Mr Holbrooke is quoted as saying that the Afghan strategy "cannot work".
He had written op-eds in the Washington Post proposing changes in American policy. He had also recommended more development aid for the new democratic government in Pakistan, especially in the tribal regions. Afghanistan and Pakistan now constituted a single theatre of war, Holbrooke wrote, where America would have an unavoidable interest long after the war in Iraq was history. "The conflict in Afghanistan will be far more costly and much, much longer than Americans realise," he wrote in March, 2008. "This war, already in its seventh year, will eventually become the longest in American history."
While expressing heartfelt condolences over the sad demise of Richard Holbrooke, Foreign Minister Makhdoom Shah Mahmood Qureshi said that he was a man of great qualities. His devotion to his profession was incomparable, and his understanding of the issues involved enviable.
Recalling his extensive engagement with Ambassador Holbrooke in the last two years, the Foreign Minister said that the Special Representative played an important role in upgrading the Pakistan-US Strategic Dialogue to the Ministerial level and expanding the scope of Pak-US relations. He helped lay the solid foundation for a broad-based relationship based on mutual respect, trust and interest. He will also be long remembered for his untiring efforts towards promoting peace and stability in the region. He has left behind a strong legacy of result-oriented diplomacy, he added.
Meanwhile, Foreign Secretary Salman Bashir expressed deep condolence over the sudden demise and said that Ambassador Holbrooke will be long remembered for his diplomatic accomplishments. He would be particularly missed as the focal point for Pakistan-US relations from the US side.
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