Nawaz attaches strings to APC participation

PML-N President Nawaz Sharif has agreed to attend the planned All-Parties Conference (APC) on Balochistan, provided the government arrest Nawab Akbar Bugti’s killers and recover all missing persons.
According to a declaration issued by the PML-N on Tuesday, the party was ready to attend the APC proposed by the government to devise a strategy to address all conflicting issues in Balochistan.
However, participation was linked to the arrest of murderers of Akbar Bugti and the recovery of missing persons, the declaration said.
Nawaz stressed upon the government to live up to the PML-N’s demands if it wanted to hold the APC and make it a success.
Meanwhile, PML-N senior leader Khawaja Saad Rafiq called the planned APC ineffective, as Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani had earlier announced the Balochistan rights package, but did not implement it.
Talking to reporters at SNGPL office, he said Balochistan was up in flames. “Baloch MPAs receive funds but most of them are siphoned off,” he alleged. He also accused PTI Chairman Imran Khan of misleading the people on the 20th Amendment, saying Khan did not even know the basics of politics. However, party insiders said the PML-N’s conditions were almost a refusal to participate in the APC. Prominent Baloch leaders, including Shahzain and Brahamdagh Bugti, have already refused to participate in the APC.
Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani on Tuesday constituted a committee that was tasked with contacting the political leadership of the country, inside and outside parliament, and convince them to agree upon a mutually convenient date for holding the APC.
Last Wednesday, Gilani had announced that the government would soon convene an All-Parties Conference (APC) to discuss and address issues of Balochistan, particularly the law and order situation in the province.
“There is a law and order situation in Balochistan, which has to be addressed. We are also talking with the coalition partners in this respect,” Gilani had said in an interaction with senior newspaper editors at the Prime Minister’s House.
He said the government’s initiative of “Aghaz-e-Haqooq-Balochistan” aimed at removing a sense of deprivation among people of the province, adding, however, the worsening law and order in Balochistan had overshadowed the initiative.