New Delhi, November 16
India today said it did not rule out the role of the United Nations in post-conflict Afghanistan for ensuring a broad-based, multi-ethnic government installed in Kabul and announced that it was very much in a “participating mode” in hammering out a political solution.

Referring to the Group of 21 meeting on Afghanistan beginning in New York today in which India had been invited, a spokesperson of the Ministry of External Affairs said: “We are very much part of the discussions.

We are in a participating mode. Ambassador S K Lamba (India’s special envoy on Afghanistan) is in New York.”

The spokesperson, however, said it was certainly not a time for being hasty. On giving a role to the UN in Afghanistan, she said it was a sensitive issue.

“There are certain dimensions to it which need to be factored into,” the spokesperson said, adding the kind of peacekeeping force and the identity of peacekeepers in Afghanistan had to be first decided.

The spokesperson also said India had not yet taken any decision to reopen its mission in Kabul and various options were being considered.

She also said India was in touch with former Afghan king Zahir Shah who may head the next interim government in Afghanistan.