WASHINGTON  – President Barack Obama hosts a White House meeting with the presidents of Afghanistan and Pakistan, two neighboring nations where crucial U.S. security concerns are at stake.

Obama and his foreign policy and national security team will be meeting with Afghan President Hamid Karzai and Pakistan’s President Asif Ali Zardari separately in the Oval Office and then together in the Cabinet Room.

Afterward, Obama will deliver remarks from the White House Grand Foyer.

The president is pressing Zardari to stand up to the threat of a wider war by Taliban and al-Qaida forces inside Pakistan. He’s also seeking broader cooperation between Zardari and Karzai, who blames the Taliban’s resurgence in his country on its havens across the border.