HAMID KHAN WAZIR
Advisor to PM on Foreign Affairs Sartaj Aziz has said that the purpose of Indian aggression and escalation along the Line of Control (LoC) was to deflect the world attention from the on-going atrocities in Indian Occupied Kashmir (IOK).
Talking to the media here on Tuesday, he said Pakistan was apprising the international community about Indian provocation along the LoC and the Working Boundary.
He said that Pakistan would continue responding effectively to India’s provocation at LoC, as our army was fully capable of responding in befitting manner to any Indian aggression.
He said that various countries were exerting pressure on India to refrain from increasing tensions with Pakistan. He said Islamabad was fully committed to ceasefire agreement with India, but New Delhi was not fulfilling its commitment.
The advisor said that the sole purpose of India’s increasing provocations along the border was to divert attention from its internal affairs. Sartaj Aziz said that Pakistan would participate in conference on Afghanistan, scheduled to be held in the first week of December in Amritsar, India, in spite of martyrdom of seven Pakistani troops in cross-border Indian firing and continuing ceasefire violations.
However, he said that the decision to have a bilateral meeting with Indian side would be taken on New Delhi’s request and according to the situation. He said though India sabotaged the 19th SAARC conference, which was due to take place in Islamabad on November 15-16, but Pakistan would not reciprocate the move and we wanted to prove that we were with the multilateral process by attending Asia Conference on Afghanistan.
About the newly-elect US president Donald Trump, he said Pakistan was also in contact with transition team of US president and his attention would be drawn to Kashmir issue for lasting peace in the region. He said that Pakistan would remind the new US president his offer of mediation between Pakistan and India to sort out the long-pending Kashmir issue.
He expressed his regret over Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf’s (PTI) decision of boycotting the joint session of the parliament addressed by the Turkish president.
Earlier, speaking at a conference titled “FATA Reforms – Transforming and Securing Pakistan” organized by the Ministry of SAFRON aimed at highlighting the importance of the proposed reforms agenda for FATA, Sartaj Aziz said that the FATA reforms aimed at consolidating historic buffer-zone areas into the national main stream and linking FATA with Pakistan core-state.
He said that around Rs 110 billion annually have been recommended under the FATA development programme in order to end the deprivation of the people of the areas.
He vowed that return and rehabilitation of the Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) and reconstruction of infrastructure, houses and shops was the highest priority to allow social life to re-start.
He said that judicial reforms would be introduced by extending jurisdiction of the Supreme Court and high court, while retaining the jirga system.
Federal Minister for States and Frontier Regions (SAFRON) Lt-General (retd) Abdul Qadir Baloch said that since 1947 entire Pakistan ruled democratically but unfortunately FATA has been governed by FRC, known as black law.
He said that FATA lawyers made legislation for entire country but ironically not for FATA.
Baloch said that FATA was ten times less developed than the rest of the country, so war-footing steps were needed to bring the areas at par with the rest of the country.
