CHICAGO — NATO chief Anders Fogh Rasmussen urged Islamabad to back efforts to stabilize Afghanistan ahead of talks Saturday with Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari, on the eve of a NATO summit.

Zardari was invited to the summit in Chicago amid expectations that Pakistan will lift a six-month blockade against NATO supply trucks that was put in place after US air strikes killed 26 Pakistani troops in November.

“We can’t solve the problems in Afghanistan without the positive engagement of Pakistan,” Rasmussen said at a policy forum in Chicago, which is hosting the summit Sunday and Monday. “We have to solve these problems,” he said, referring to concerns that insurgents take advantage of the porous Afghan-Pakistani border region to take sanctuary inside Pakistan. — AFP