Turkey promises to work with India for a stable Afghanistan

Turkish president Abdullah Gul, currently on a four-day visit to the country, was given a warm welcome in the capital even though Ankara had snubbed India last month by leaving it out of a regional conference on Afghanistan held in Istanbul.

“India protested, Ankara apologised, and we’ve moved on,’’ a senior official confirmed. The matter was settled before Gul landed in India on Sunday. The Turkish president’s major meetings with government leaders took place on Tuesday.

During delegation-level talks  between prime minister Manmohan Singh and president Gul, Afghanistan came up for discussion. “Gul said India’s contribution to Afghanistan is very important and expressed the desire to work with India in bringing stability in that country,” a statement by the external affairs ministry said.

Turkey has invited India to be part of the next regional conference on Afghanistan. Ankara’s decision to exclude India from the regional meet was at Pakistan’s insistence. Overlooking this, New Delhi and Ankara issued a joint declaration on terrorism in which both agreed to work towards finalising the Comprehensive Convention on International Terrorism, which India had proposed at the UN in 1996.