Daily Times

Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) Chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari has taken serious notice of withdrawal of security given to former prime minister Yousuf Raza Gilani by the caretaker government and described it as a criminal act.

In a statement issued on Sunday, the PPP chairman asked the government to clarify as to whom it wanted to facilitate by withdrawing security and whether the government did not know that his family had been the target of terrorists.

The PPP scion pointed out that Ali Haider Gilani had suffered due to such criminal negligence in the past, adding that the government should formally announce that it would take responsibility for any untoward incident.

The government should tell for whom it was paving way by taking back security of key political personality. “Was the step taken on the whims of incoming rulers who had been calling terrorists as their brothers?”

The PPP chairman said that following the martyrdom of Haroon Bilour, Siraj Raisani and hundreds of their companions, the government should have been more concerned but that was not the case.

The PPP chairman demanded that security of former premier Gillani and entire political leadership of the country should be ensured without any delinquency.

Separately, the intelligence agencies on Sunday issued “an alert advising strict security measures after receiving credible information that Awami National Party (ANP) leader Mian Iftikhar Hussain could be targeted in a suicide attack”.

According to the alert, a suicide bomber is currently being trained in Kunar area of Afghanistan. Security agencies said the “suspect is scheduled to cross the border in the next few days”.

Published in Daily Times, August 13^th 2018.