WASHINGTON: Welcoming Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar’s visit to Afghanistan, the State Department on Thursday said the United State supports efforts towards improved ties between the two South Asian countries in wide-ranging areas.

“It seems to have been a good and well-timed visit,” State Department spokesperson Victoria Nuland said at the daily briefing, adding that Washington awaits debriefing from officials of both countries on the visit to Kabul by Pakistani foreign minister this week.

The United States, she said, has “always supported good neighbourly relations, dialogue and collaboration” between Pakistan and Afghanistan on advancing their security, political and economic relations.”There have been very positive statements from the visit about Pakistan’s support (on) Afghan-owned process of reconciliation. That is something that the Afghans have wanted to hear and we think will be helpful to the process,” the spokesperson noted.

Responding to a question about statements that Pakistan would be willing to help bring Afghan groups including the Haqqanis to the negotiating table as part of  efforts to help Afghanistan as Kabul wants, the spokesperson replied. “As you know, when the Secretary (Clinton) was in Pakistan and with the interagency delegation, one of our main asks at that time was that we do more with regard to the Haqqani Network. So positive statements of commitment in that regard, whether they’re made to us, whether they’re made to Afghanistan, that’s a good thing.”

Answering a question in the context of US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta’s stated goal to end American combat operations in Afghanistan by next year, the spokesperson reiterated Washington’s commitment to long-term engagement with Afghanistan and the region. She added the US remains committed to NATO deadline of 2014 goal of completely transferring security responsibilities to the Afghans and that any progress on transition depends on the ground realities.

(Read: US plans to halt Afghan combat role early surprise Kabul)

Travel warning a regular update

In answer to a question about the updated travel warning for American citizens visiting Pakistan, the spokesperson said the update was not prompted by any worsening security situation and it was not meant to be a report card.

(Read: Security concerns: US warns citizens travelling to Pakistan)

“No. I think you know that on any country where we have a Travel Warning, we update those on a regular basis every six months. So every six months, any Travel Warning is updated. So if you go and you look at the changes, essentially what you will see there are updates of some of the incidents that we’ve seen in Pakistan or with Americans in the last six months which were not in our previous warning. But the general thrust remains the same with regard to our warnings to American travellers, et cetera.”

“What you’ll see there is references to the November 26th incident, which obviously raised tensions. You’ll see references to some of the kidnappings that we’ve seen since the last warning. So this is not a report card. It’s designed to be a factual report of some of the incidences that guide our continued warning to Americans. The fundamental warning hasn’t changed.”