Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Monday announced that an offensive was being launched against terrorists in the rural and urban areas of the country in an apparent expansion of the ongoing Operation Zarb-e-Azb in North Waziristan and Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA).
Soon after the prime minister’s announcement, police and Sindh Rangers killed at least 13 terrorists belonging to the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and al Qaeda in Karachi.
DECISIVE BATTLE:
“One Zarb-e-Azb is being fought in the tribal areas and a second Zarb-e-Azb will be fought against those who are hiding in our cities and villages,” the premier said while chairing a four-hour-long high-level meeting at Prime Minister’s House. The premier vowed that a decisive battle would be fought against all terrorists, including those responsible for the Hazara Town in Quetta and the Peshawar church attack. “The government will not differentiate between terrorists and their facilitators. They both will be taken out,” Sharif said, adding that terrorism and sectarianism are a cancer for this country and now the time has come to root it out.
Sources said that the meeting discussed various plans, including overhauling of criminal justice, and a new administrative and legislative system in the country.
Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar, SAFRON Minister Abdul Qadir Baloch, Finance Minister Ishaq Dar, Attorney General Salman Aslam Butt and special assistants to the premier Khawaja Zaheer and Barrister Zafarullah attended the meeting.