US scraps role of Af-Pak envoy

washington — The United States abolished the role of its special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan on Friday, just as it prepares to send thousands more troops to the region.

A senior State Department official said that acting special representative Laurel Miller was stepping down and would not be replaced in the post.

The office was created when US officials decided that the conflicts in Afghanistan and Pakistan are inextricably linked and ought to be dealt with together.

But President Donald Trump came to office planning to slash diplomatic spending and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson plans to cut several special envoy roles.

Miller’s responsibilities will now fall under the department’s South and Central Asian Affairs Bureau, which has a much bigger footprint that includes India. But this bureau is itself leaderless, with no assistant secretary appointed to lead it and no-one nominated by the new administration for senate approval.