Pakistan to cooperate with UN monitors

Pakistan will cooperate with UN monitoring of the arms embargo component of the sanctions imposed on Afghanistan, a foreign ministry spokesperson confirmed on Wednesday. “As a member of the United Nations, Pakistan is supposed to carry out the resolution, and we will do it in good faith,” the spokesperson told IRIN on Thursday. Following a unanimous vote by UN Security Council members on Monday, a team of experts was approved to monitor the embargo. The weapons sanctions, enforced last December, aim to pressure the Taliban into surrendering Saudi dissident Usama bin Ladin, and closing alleged terrorist training camps. Bin Ladin is accused by the US of masterminding the bombings of two US embassies in Africa in 1998. In November 1999, the Council also froze Taliban assets abroad, and banned the national Afghan airline, Ariana, from operating international flights. The team will comprise a monitoring group of up to five experts in New York, and a sanctions enforcement support team of up to 15 members, located in Afghanistan’s six neighbouring states of China, Iran, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. The five experts in New York will be monitoring the implementation of all measures, including those concerning the arms embargoes, terrorism, money laundering and financial transactions related to the purchasing of arms and drug trafficking. With expertise in areas such as customs, border security and counter-terrorism, members of the support team will report back to the monitoring group at least once a month. However, there has been scepticism over whether the 15-member support team will be able to work effectively in neighbouring countries. “It would be a difficult task to closely monitor all of the entry points into Afghanistan,” the chairman of the department for defence and strategic studies at Quaid-e-Azam University in Islamabad, Rifat Hussain, told IRIN. He added that even with full cooperation from Pakistan, there were 5,324 possible crossing points on the borders of Afghanistan, with monitoring left in the hands of local security forces. “Members of the local security teams will have sympathies with neighbouring countries, and border guards could turn a blind eye to the flow of weapons.” Hussain said he hoped monitoring would not have an effect on humanitarian assistance. “Trucks carrying aid into Afghanistan will be stopped and checked too. This could slow down the process of essential supplies reaching the needy,” he said. Hussain explained that not only could it be a logistical nightmare, but the team could also provoke tension between the UN and the Taliban. A Pakistani newspaper on Thursday quoted a Taliban official saying that “monitors would be treated as foreign invaders”.