Daily Times

KARACHI: The war against terrorism continues to financially bleed the country as Pakistan had to spend $126.79 billion in direct and indirect costs due to incidents of terrorism in the last 17 years, according to the Economic Survey of Pakistan 2017-18 issued on Thursday.

The government claimed that after facing protracted violence for more than a decade, Pakistan has achieved progressive and significant improvement in the country’s overall security landscape in the recent years.This has been achieved primarily due to comprehensive counter-terrorism operation culminating with Zarb-e-Azb and Khyber 1-IV operations and counter-terrorism measure taken by the government under the framework of the National Action Plan (NAP) and the sacrifices of the security forces.This has resulted in a major decline in the number of terrorist attacks as well as the causalities suffered. Pakistan’s success in countering-terrorism has been acknowledged in the recent Global Terrorism Index Report, 2017, published by the Sydney-based Institute for Economics and Peace.

The survey, while quoting the Global Terrorism Index Report, 2017, stated that Pakistan ranked at 5th out of 163 countries with a score of 8.4 out of 10 on the index, a marked improvement from 2007 when it ranked 4th.Pakistan has shown improvement in its global terrorism index ranking with decline in the terrorism incidences and the deaths related to the terrorist activities. This is the third consecutive year that Pakistan has witnessed fewer terrorist attacks and deaths.

India ranked 8th, Turkey 9th, Bangladesh 21st, Saudi Arabia 26, China 31, United States 32, Russia 33, and United Kingdom 35 at the index. Along with Pakistan, a positive trend was also noted in Afghanistan, Nigeria, and Syria. These current developments in Pakistan’s fight against terrorism are benchmarks for not just regional countries but for the international community as well. While Pakistan is successfully fighting the terrorists on its soil, it also expects the US, NATO and Afghan forces to do the same in Afghanistan, added the survey report.

Published in Daily Times, April 27^th 2018.