Adviser to Prime Minister on Foreign Affairs Tariq Fatemi has said that Pakistan would be willing to discuss with US president-elect Donald Trump’s administration the matter of release of jailed Pakistani doctor Dr Shakil Afridi who ran a fake polio compaign to help the US track down al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden.
“We are not holding on to Dr Afridi because of some personal animosity. Pakistan would be willing to look at how we could move forward in a resolution of this problem,” Fatemi said in a conversation with VOA Urdu service.
Fatemi said that a presidential pardon could be sought for the doctor under Pakistani laws but only after judicial proceedings were concluded.
“The whole process has to go through the judiciary, and it is for the judiciary then to decide whether a case is ripe or not ripe for it to be sent to before the president for a possible exercise of the powers of the president to give pardon,” Fatemi said.
He also reiterated that Afridi’s fake immunization drive seriously hurt and raised suspicions about vaccination programs the World Health Organization is running in Pakistan.
Afridi was hailed as a hero in the US for helping the CIA obtain the Bin Laden family’s DNA by running a fake immunisation campaign in the garrison city of Abbottabad.
Shakil Afridi is serving 33 years of jail term on treason charges.
