by Mehdi Bagheri

    TEHRAN, March 31 (Xinhua) -- While Washington engages Iran eyeing its role in peace and security in the war-torn country and initiating unconditional talks with Iran over its nuclear issue, Tehran still pursues its own objectives.

    Iran's representative to a one-day international conference on Afghanistan, which was opened in The Hague of the Netherlands on Tuesday, reaffirmed his country's rejection of a U.S. plan to boost its troops in Afghanistan.

    Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Medhi Akhundzadeh said the presence of foreign forces in Afghanistan does not help the situation in the country and that the international community needs to tackle the root causes of terrorism.

    "The presence of foreign forces has not improved things in the country and it seems that an increase in the number of foreign forces will prove ineffective, too," he said.

    Akhundzadeh said the military expenses should be redirected to the training of the Afghan army and police and that the Afghan government should lead the government-building process.

    He also asked the international community to tackle the root causes of terrorism and avoid introducing double standards on terrorism.

    The Iranian diplomat told the official IRNA news agency in The Hague that Iran "supports a regional solution to" the Afghanistan issue, which is, as observers concede, the same policy that Iran was pursuing over the foreign troops in Iraq.

    He attributed the failure of the resolutions developed for Afghanistan to the interference of the aliens (nations out of the region) in regional issues.

    "The dead-end status with which the NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) is faced today is due to this fact, and also because the mere presence of foreign military forces in a country can lead to increased emergence of extremism in that country," he added.

    NATO is leading a 60,000-strong international force in Afghanistan. U.S. President Barack Obama has announced the deployment of 17,000 additional troops in the upcoming months.

    While Tehran sounds pessimist about the promotion of security and peace in Afghanistan by an increase in the number of international forces there, deputy spokesman of Afghan presidential palace Siamak Harawi is on the opposite with Iran.

    He underlined "the need for promotion of security in Afghanistan" by calling for a further participation of and coordination among the international forces in his country.

    Alongside the discontent with the presence of the aliens in its backyard, Iran never conceals its inclination to participate as a sole regional power in doing the political and economic issues of its neighboring country to imprint and expand its influence there.

    Akhundzadeh said Iran is fully prepared to participate in reconstruction projects of Afghanistan and to make efforts to halt drug trafficking.

    "Iran has during the course of the past seven years managed to gain the trust of the Afghan nation by seriously pursuing construction projects in their country and that is also the reason why the other countries admit that both the Afghan nation and the Afghan government attach great importance to cooperation with Iran," he added.

    On Sunday, a preliminary Moscow conference on Afghanistan proposed the replacement of part of NATO forces in Afghanistan by Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) forces, where major attention was paid to narcotic drugs trafficking, terrorism, and organized crime problems.

    Enjoying good ties with the SCO member states, Tehran did not hide its agreement with the proposal that the SCO member and observer countries gradually replace the West, especially the United States, considered by the Islamic Republic as the ideological foe.

    The conferences both in Moscow and The Hague which brought together officials from influential countries bore potentials for a rare diplomatic encounter between the United States and Iran.

    Iran's foreign ministry, however, denied on Monday any meeting between Iranian and U.S. officials in Moscow, according to IRNA.

    An informed source in the ministry denied Sunday's report of the Weekly Sunday Times concerning the meeting between Tehran and Washington's representatives in Russia, saying it was baseless, IRNA said. 

Iran: Foreign military presence in Afghanistan not helpful

    THE HAGUE, March 31 (Xinhua) -- The presence of foreign forces in Afghanistan does not help the situation in the country and the international community needs to tackle the root causes of terrorism, Iran told an international conference on Afghanistan on Tuesday.

    "The presence of foreign forces has not improved things in the country and it seems that an increase in the number of foreign forces will prove ineffective, too," said Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Medhi Akhundzadeh.  Full story

International conference stresses regional dimension of Afghanistan issue

    THE HAGUE, March 31 (Xinhua) -- The international conference on Afghanistan in The Hague sought engagement of Afghanistan's neighbors, marking a shift of strategy of the West more than seven years into the war.

    The regional dimension of the issue of Afghanistan became a keyword for Tuesday's conference, which brought together high-ranking officials from 72 countries and a dozen international organizations.  Full story