The Parliamentary Committee on National Security refused on Tuesday to attend the briefing of the Pakistan Army on the issue of national security at General Headquarters (GHQ).
“The meeting of the Parliamentary Committee on National Security, held at Parliament House, unanimously decided that it will not attend the briefing at the GHQ as it will be in violation of its traditions,” Senator Raza Rabbani, who heads the committee, told reporters after the in-camera meeting. The army was to hold the briefing on Thursday at GHQ for the committee and standing bodies on defence and defence productions. Chief of Army Staff General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani and Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) Director General Lt General Ahmad Shuja Pasha are scheduled to brief the committees.
Explaining reasons for the committee’s refusal to attend, Rabbani said: “The committee came into being as a result of a resolution by the joint session of parliament on October 22, 2008, with clear terms of references (ToRs) and it is a part of parliament. It has been meeting in-camera at Parliament House and the committee decided to continue following its tradition of holding meetings at Parliament House as no one is superior to parliament”, Rabbani said. He said further that its tradition did not allow the committee to take briefings from “other organisations outside Parliament House”. “If the GHQ wants to brief the committee, it has to come to us,” he added.
A member of the committee also told Pakistan Today on condition of anonymity that the committee was not against the briefing from the military leadership but it wanted that briefing to take place at Parliament House. When asked that other committees were also parts of parliament and they had agreed to go to the GHQ for the briefing, Rabbani said he could not speak on the behalf of other committees and it was up to them to decide, but his committee unanimously decided not to go to GHQ to take the briefing. He also said that the original agenda of the committee about Pakistan-US relations was cancelled and now it would be taken up in the next meeting. Reportedly, the parliamentary committees had written letters to GHQ and the ISI for a briefing on the security situation, relations with the US and challenges being faced by the country and the military authorities in response had decided to brief the committees together on Thursday at the GHQ.
