LAHORE
Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani on Sunday called on foreign-based Pakistani journalists to play their due role in removing all misconceptions about the country on the international front.
He was talking to a six-member Pakistan Journalists Association delegation from the UK, headed by Tahir Chaudhry, at his residence. A representative of a charity organisation called the Muslim Hands was also present on the occasion.
The prime minister said that Pakistan had been in the middle of the war against terrorism and facing an economic recession, when it was hit by the worst floods in its history. The multiplicity of the problems confronting the country demanded that the international community fulfill its responsibilities to assist the country in all possible ways, he told the delegation.
Pakistan was consistently seeking access to America and European markets for trade, which meant that Islamabad wanted to get rid of its dependence on aid and was determined to improve its economic health, he asserted. Gilani appreciated the efforts of the foreign-based Pakistani journalists for creating awareness among the Pakistani Diaspora about the victims of the flood.
“You have done a noble job and now you should also make efforts to improve the country’s image in the comity of nations particularly the UK.” Gilani said that the government was following the same national strategy that was adopted for the rehabilitation of 2.5 million internally displaced persons of Swat, for the rehabilitation of the flood victims.
Besides that, he said, “we have established an Oversight Disaster Management Council in consultation with all provinces at the platform of the Council of Common Interests.” He said that the federal government had also shared the distribution of the Watan Cards for flood victims with the provinces to make the scheme more authentic and credible.
The PM said that the World Bank (WB) and Asian Development Bank (ADB) would present their preliminary report on Disaster Need Assessment (DNA) within a few days and the final version of this report would probably be published next month.
