ISLAMABAD: Pakistan hosted a rare regional defense conference on Saturday, with officials from the United States joining their counterparts from four Central Asian republics to discuss enhanced military cooperation and counterterrorism coordination in the neighborhood.
The US maintained a significant military presence in the region through Afghanistan until the withdrawal of international forces in August 2021. The conference in Islamabad marked the first multilateral defense engagement of its kind hosted by Pakistan amid a gradual thaw in relations between Islamabad and Washington, with participation from Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan.
Many of the participating Central Asian states share borders with or lie close to Afghanistan and remain exposed to the spillover effects of militant violence, narcotics trafficking and regional instability.
Pakistan, which shares a porous frontier with Afghanistan, has repeatedly called for deeper security cooperation to confront shared threats in the aftermath of the Afghan conflict.
“In an era defined by transnational threats and complex hybrid challenges, the imperative for deeper military-to-military cooperation, strategic dialogue and mutual trust is paramount,” Pakistan’s Chief of Army Staff Field Marshal Syed Asim
