ISLAMABAD—Pakistani Defence Minister Khawaja Asif has asked Afghan Defence Minister Mullah Yaqoob to exclude Punjab from any future retaliation against Pakistan, assuring Kabul that the remaining provinces provide ample territory for expressing bilateral frustration.
The request followed Yaqoob’s warning that Pakistan could not attack Afghanistan and expect its own cities to remain secure.
Asif acknowledged Afghanistan’s right to respond but urged Kabul to respect Pakistan’s longstanding security doctrine that consequences should be distributed federally while protection remains centralized.
“Pakistan is a federation,” Asif explained. “There is Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Balochistan, Sindh and several other places visible on the map. We encourage our Afghan brothers to explore them.”
Officials clarified that Islamabad was also technically part of Pakistan but requested professional courtesy because that was where officials explaining why the rest of Pakistan was insecure worked.
The Defence Ministry also asked Kabul to occasionally acknowledge that Pakistan’s insecurity was caused by Afghan intransigence. Officials said no formal admission was necessary; an ambiguous sentence, concerned facial expression or failure to interrupt a Pakistani spokesman would suffice.
“This helps everyone,” one official explained. “Afghanistan gets sovereignty, and we get the footnote explaining why we had to violate it.”
Pakistan said the concession would allow its delegation at the UN General Assembly to explain that decades of Pakistani interference in Afghanistan had produced so much instability in Pakistan that further Pakistani interference in Afghanistan was now unavoidable.
Under the proposal, Afghanistan would retain its flag, anthem and UN seat, while its security policy, border management and acceptable friendships would be subcontracted to Islamabad until Afghanistan became sufficiently independent to make the decisions Pakistan preferred.
Officials stressed that Pakistan had absolutely no desire to control Afghanistan.
It merely wanted Afghanistan to stop resisting being independent under Pakistani management.