America's chief diplomat for South Asia Alice Wells on Monday held talks with Pakistan's Interior Minister Brig (retd) Ijaz Shah during which the two sides discussed key bilateral and regional issues with main focus on the Afghan peace process.
Wells arrived here on Sunday on a four-day trip after visiting India and Sri Lanka, according to officials of Foreign Office.
Her key engagement was a detailed meeting with Interior Minister Shah where issues like illegal immigrants to US, registration of international non-governmental organization (INGOs) and the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) were discussed, officials said.
Wells in her discussion on the issue of the FATF appreciated Pakistan's efforts to comply with the regime of anti-money laundering watchdog.
"It is heartening to see that Pakistan's government has made significant progress on these matters and that too in a short time," she said.
The FATF in October decided to keep Pakistan on its 'Grey' list for failure to curb funnelling of funds to terror groups Lashkar-e-Taiba, Jaish-e-Mohammad and others.
If not removed off the list by April, Pakistan may move to a blacklist of countries that face severe economic sanctions, such as Iran.
Pakistan has urged the US to support its bid to exit from the grey list of the FATF.
Wells also said that the problem of illegal immigrants from Pakistan to the US was addressed by the two sides to a great extent. "We appreciate the Pakistan government's cooperation on the matter, she said.
Shah said that a system was put in place to verify the documents of immigrants and identify them.
He also informed the US diplomat about efforts to streamline the working of INGOs by allowing all genuine aid groups to get register and work in Pakistan.
The US diplomat is also expected to hold talks with security and foreign policy officials about the Afghan reconciliation process which is going through a critical stage. Defence ties between the two sides are also to be discussed.
Her visit came at the conclusion of Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Queshi's trip to US where he held talks with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, National Security Adviser Robert O' Brien, and Under Secretary of Defence John Rood.
Officials said that her visit was planned well before Qureshi's trip which was prompted by the tensions between the US and Iran after the killing of a top Iranian general in an American drone strike in Iraq.
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