China says Afghan president vows to help China fight extremists - elEconomista.es
BEIJING (Reuters) - Afghanistan's President Ashraf Ghani has pledged to help China fight Islamist extremists, a senior Chinese official said on Tuesday, after Ghani met President Xi Jinping in Beijing on his first visit abroad since his September inauguration.
China, which is connected to Afghanistan by the narrow, almost impassable Wakhan Corridor, says militants seeking to set up a separate state called East Turkistan in its western Xinjiang region are holed up along the ungoverned Afghan-Pakistani border.
Leaders in Beijing, who have been bracing for more responsibility in Afghanistan as the bulk of U.S.-led troops pull out, worry that ethnic Uighur separatists from Xinjiang will take advantage if the country again descends into chaos.
"In the area of security, President Ghani expressed the readiness and staunch support from the Afghan side in China's fight against East Turkistan Islamic Movement terrorist forces," Kong Xuanyou, Director General of the Foreign Ministry's Asian Affairs Department, told journalists after Ghani and Xi met.
Kong said China would give 1.5 billion yuan (152 million pounds) in aid to Afghanistan over the next three years and would help train 3,000 Afghan professionals over the next five years.
Leer más: China says Afghan president vows to help China fight extremists - elEconomista.es China says Afghan president vows to help China fight extremists - elEconomista.es
BEIJING (Reuters) - Afghanistan's President Ashraf Ghani has pledged to help China fight Islamist extremists, a senior Chinese official said on Tuesday, after Ghani met President Xi Jinping in Beijing on his first visit abroad since his September inauguration.
China, which is connected to Afghanistan by the narrow, almost impassable Wakhan Corridor, says militants seeking to set up a separate state called East Turkistan in its western Xinjiang region are holed up along the ungoverned Afghan-Pakistani border.
Leaders in Beijing, who have been bracing for more responsibility in Afghanistan as the bulk of U.S.-led troops pull out, worry that ethnic Uighur separatists from Xinjiang will take advantage if the country again descends into chaos.
"In the area of security, President Ghani expressed the readiness and staunch support from the Afghan side in China's fight against East Turkistan Islamic Movement terrorist forces," Kong Xuanyou, Director General of the Foreign Ministry's Asian Affairs Department, told journalists after Ghani and Xi met.
Kong said China would give 1.5 billion yuan (152 million pounds) in aid to Afghanistan over the next three years and would help train 3,000 Afghan professionals over the next five years.
Leer más: China says Afghan president vows to help China fight extremists - elEconomista.es China says Afghan president vows to help China fight extremists - elEconomista.es