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WASHINGTON: CIA Director Leon Panetta said on Sunday he was aware of Pakistan’s efforts to help negotiate a deal between the Haqqani network and the Afghan government but did not see a real desire among the militants to seek reconciliation.

Earlier in the day, Al Jazeera television reported that Afghan President Hamid Karzai had held face-to-face talks with Sirajuddin Haqqani, leader of a major anti-government faction.

But official sources told Dawn in Islamabad on Sunday that there had been no meeting between President Karzai and Mr Haqqani. The sources, however, said that Army Chief Gen Ashfaq Pervez Kayani would visit Kabul on Monday.

Dawn reported on June 15 that Pakistan had dived headlong into the Afghanistan reconciliation process by taking on the task of acting as a bridge between the Haqqani network and the government in Kabul.

Dawn also reported that Islamabad had presented to Kabul a roadmap for a political settlement between the Karzai government and the Haqqanis.

At the weekend, the US State Department had said that Afghanistan and Pakistan were holding direct talks with the Taliban insurgents, adding that Washington wanted to see Pakistan play a supportive role in this broader process.

“Obviously there are discussions going on between Afghan officials and Pakistani officials, and we certainly want to see ways in which Pakistan can be supportive of this broader process,” said the department’s spokesman Phillip J. Crowley. Earlier this month, India also indicated that it was willing to discuss Afghanistan with Islamabad, an option New Delhi had previously rejected.

In an interview to ABC ‘This Week’ talks show on Sunday, the CIA chief said he was aware of reports that Pakistan was helping the Afghan government to negotiate a deal with the militants but had not seen any ‘real interest’ among the insurgents for reconciliation. The militants, he said, would not seek reconciliation until they realised they were going to lose the war.

“I read all the same stories, we get intelligence along those lines, but the bottom line is that we really have not seen any firm intelligence that there’s a real interest among the Taliban, the militant allies of Al Qaeda, Al Qaeda itself, the Haqqanis, TTP, other militant groups,” said the CIA chief when asked to comment on these reports.

“We have seen no evidence that they are truly interested in reconciliation, where they would surrender their arms, where they would denounce Al Qaeda, where they would really try to become part of that society. We’ve seen no evidence of that.”

Mr Panetta said the militants would only seek reconciliation when they feared losing the war. “Very frankly, my view is that with regard to reconciliation, unless they’re convinced that the United States is going to win and that they’re going to be defeated, I think it’s very difficult to proceed with a reconciliation that’s going to be meaningful,” he said.

But Al Jazeera insisted that the Karzai-Haqqani meeting did take place and that Pakistan’s army and ISI chiefs accompanied Mr Haqqani to the meeting with the Afghan president.

The television also reported that President Karzai’s office had denied that any such meeting and so had Major General Athar Abbas, the Pakistani army spokesman.

Earlier this week, The New York Times reported that Pakistani officials had told Afghan officials they could deliver the Haqqani network into a power- sharing arrangement with them. Afghan officials told NYT that the Pakistanis were pushing various other proxies with Gen Kayani personally offering to broker a deal with the Taliban leadership.

Al Jazeera, however, not only insisted that its report was correct but also observed that reports about Mr Karzai’s meeting with Mr Haqqani had fuelled increased speculation in Kabul that Pakistan was trying to strike a deal in Afghanistan that would safeguard its interests there.

The report also referred to the resignation of two hard-core opponents of the Taliban: Amrullah Saleh, the head of the Afghan intelligence, and Hanif Atmar, the interior minister, earlier this month.

Al Jazeera indicated that the resignations might be linked to Mr Karzai’s interest in seeking a deal with militants like Mr Haqqani.

Hekmat Karzai, director of the Kabul-based Centre for Conflict and Peace Studies, told Al Jazeera he believed that only a pragmatic leader who understood the realities of Afghanistan and the region would pursue such talks.

“The fact (is) that regional players support is needed, particularly Pakistan,” he said.

“Without a doubt Amrullah Saleh was not happy with Pakistani politics, and Pakistan considered him an obstacle in the way of them gaining a foothold in Afghanistan,” Ahmed Saeedi, a political analyst in Kabul, told Al Jazeera.

“The Pakistanis have always said if you want peace you have to go through us.

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