Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: The Interior Ministry on Friday formally raised objections on the report of an inquiry commission constituted for probing the Quetta incident that left 73 people dead, most of them lawyers, and 104 people injured.

Advocate Makhdoom Ali Khan filed a 64-page document, including the objections and replies to the recommendations and findings, in the top court.

The inquiry commission, headed by Justice Qazi Faez Isa of Supreme Court, had observed that the Interior Ministry was without a clear leadership and direction; consequently, it was confused about its role in combating terrorism, while Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar displayed little sense of ministerial responsibility.

To this, the ministry said that the commission’s findings were incorrect and contrary to the record, and not based on any evidence to support the claims. The report had mentioned a meeting between Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar and Maulana Muhammad Ahmed Ludhianvi, head of banned organisation Ahle Sunnat Wal Jamaat (ASWJ).

However, the ministry submitted that the observation of the commission was incorrect, as the interior minister had met a delegation of Defa-e-Pakistan Council (DPC) led by Maulana Samiul Haq, which was not a proscribed organisation. “The minister was unaware that Maulana Ludhianvi would accompany Maulana Samiul Haq. He had no prior notice of Maulana Ludhianvi’s arrival,” it contended. It also said that intelligence agencies take their time to reach conclusions, after thorough considerations.

In the objections, the ministry said that the finding of the commission that “National Counter Terrorism Authority’s (NACTA) act of seeking input from the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI)/ Intelligence Bureau (IB) is illogical” was flawed.

The document also includes submissions on 18 recommendations that were made in the commission’s report, stating that proscription of terrorist organisations was a continuous exercise conducted by the federal government, and that 64 organisations had been proscribed to date. On Nisar’s directives, the State Bank of Pakistan intimated that 5,023 bank accounts relating to individuals (listed in fourth schedule of the Anti-Terrorism Act, 1997) and eight bank accounts of proscribed organisations had been frozen, the document stated.

On a recommendation that public functionaries should not be “cavorting” with members of banned organisations, the ministry submitted that the Anti-Terrorism Act, 1997 “does not restrain” public functionaries from meeting persons on the fourth schedule if they seek such a meeting for getting their lawful grievances redressed.

The ministry stated that it was not responsible for establishment of forensic laboratories in the provinces, as it was the provincial governments’ job, but the Centre could provide them scientific or technical assistance.

“It may be added that [an amount of] Rs 79.6 billion has been spent on establishing 59 new units/posts of civil armed forces for strengthening the security, especially of the western borders. These posts will be [made] operational in the current year. It is submitted that by 2020, Pakistan will be amongst the top six countries with completely monitored borders,” the Interior Ministry claimed.

It further stated that the federal and provincial governments had given Rs 4.6 billion in compensation to the victims in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Balochistan and Sindh, while a separate amount of Rs 1.06 billion had been distributed among the victims in FATA.

It stated that the ministry, under the leadership of Chaudhry Nisar, had initiated numerous measures to combat terrorism, subsequently decreasing the attacks in Pakistan by 70 percent. It, however, stated that terrorism “cannot be eliminated overnight”. It said that the Interior Ministry was spearheading the war on terror, and was steadily making progress.

“There is also no basis for the finding in the [inquiry commission’s] report that the ministry is more interested in serving the minister than the people of Pakistan. This observation has been made without any evidence and not supported by [any] record,” the document stated. A three-judge bench, headed by Justice Amir Hani Muslim, will take up the case on February 6.