Pakistan to review
US ties after ‘attack on peace,’ says Nisar
Calling the drone
strike that killed Pakistani Taliban chief Hakimullah Mehsud on Friday “an
attack on regional peace by America,” Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Saturday
said bilateral ties with the US will now be reviewed.
Speaking to a press
conference at the interior ministry, Nisar vowed to raise the matter at
international forums, including the United Nations.
Nisar said an urgent
meeting of the Cabinet Committee on National Security (CCNS) has been called to
review bilateral cooperation and ties with the US. The meeting is expected to
take place in coming two to three days upon return of Prime Minister Nawaz
Sharif from London, he added.
Mehsud, along with at
least five other militants, was killed when a US drone targeted his car in the
North Waziristan tribal district of Pakistan near the Afghan border.
The interior minister
said a three-member committee, comprising Islamic clerics, was scheduled to
leave for a meeting with the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) leadership on
Saturday morning.
Nisar said the
identity of those killed in the drone strike was irrelevant. The government of
Pakistan does not see this drone attack as an attack on an individual but as an
attack on the peace process, he said.
Claiming that TTP
leadership including Hakimullah was aware of the meeting, he said he had
written and had telephonic records of recent correspondence between the
government and the militant outfit.
Earlier on Friday,
Pakistani Taliban spokesman Shahidullah Shahid had said the Taliban had had “no
contact” with the government, a day after Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif said a
process to initiate peace talks had already begun.
Chaudhry Nisar
questioned timings of the Hakimullah’s killing asking why he was targeted just
a day before the talks.
“Can this be called
supporting peace initiative?” he asked.
The minister said that
five permanent members of the UN Security Council will also be contacted on the
issue.
Meanwhile, the
Pakistani government summoned the US ambassador to protest over the Friday drone
strike.
A statement from the
Foreign Office said Friday's strike was “counter-productive to Pakistan's
efforts to bring peace and stability to Pakistan and the region”.
Since its creation six
years ago, the TTP has killed thousands of civilians, soldiers and police in
its bloody insurgency against the Pakistani state. Pakistan routinely condemns
drone strikes on its soil as a violation of sovereignty and terms them counterproductive
to efforts to end militancy.
المشاركات
0 التعليقات:
إرسال تعليق