Russia welcomes new U.S. Afghan policy

By Oleg Shchedrov

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia welcomes "increasingly transparent" U.S. policy on Afghanistan and Pakistan and sees new areas of cooperation with the West in settling the Afghan conflict, the Kremlin's senior foreign policy adviser said on Sunday.

Afghanistan is expected to become a major topic at a summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) in the Urals city of Yekaterinburg on Monday.

The SCO groups Russia, China and the ex-Soviet Central Asian republics of Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. But leaders of Afghanistan, Pakistan, India and Iran, whose states have observer status, will also attend the summit.

"We welcome the increasingly transparent U.S. policy on Afghanistan and Pakistan," Sergei Prikhodko told reporters. "The space for cooperation with the West on Afghanistan can be broader."

Russia backed the U.S.-led military operation launched in 2001 to topple Afghanistan's Taliban rulers but has since criticised Washington for its conduct, which Moscow believes contributes to instability in the region.

However, earlier this year Russia and its Central Asian allies agreed to allow non-lethal supplies to the international forces in Afghanistan to go through their territory complementing a current route via Pakistan.

Cooperation on Afghanistan is a key element in attempts by Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and U.S. President Barack Obama to reset relations between Moscow and Washington which have reached post-Cold war lows in the past few years.