Abdullah briefs Grossman on Afghan situation

WASHINGTON (PAN Mark Grossman and State Department officials.

“I can confirm that the former Afghan foreign minister met with Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan Ambassador Marc Grossman, as well as Assistant Secretary for Democracy, Human Rights and Labor Michael Posner,” State Department spokesman Mark Toner said on Wednesday.

“We are not going to get into the details of our private conversations with Abdullah Abdullah, but you can rest assured that, obviously, there was a human rights angle to his talk with Michael Posner, but also with Marc Grossman,” he said.

“I’m sure it was a wide-ranging discussion about all the issues concerning our relationship with Pakistan,” Toner said. “I can imagine it was a frank discussion of the challenges we face there,” he said in response to a question.

Abdullah is currently on a 10-day visit to Washington to brief US think-tanks and policymakers on the ground realties in Afghanistan. He launched an anti-Karzai blitz, accusing him of being part of the problem, soon after his arrival in the US.

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