Additional demands : South Punjab needs a Karachi-like operation by Rangers

BAHALWALPUR:

South Punjab needs a Karachi-like operation conducted by Rangers, Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf leader Farzand Ali Goheer said at a press conference at the Bahawalpur Press Club on Tuesday. “This is the only way to effectively weed out terrorists and their facilitators in the Punjab,” he said. The PTI leader demanded that the facilitators of terrorists be dealt the same punishments as terrorists. “Their sentences must be swift and harsh.”     He said the reason why the police alone could not be trusted with rooting out extremism and terrorism in the province was the political influence. “We demand that VVIP protocols be lifted and the police left alone to do their work without interference.”   He said the suicide attack at Gulshan-i-Iqbal Park in Lahore on Sunday had raised glaring questions about the government’s failure in securing citizens of the Punjab. “The government’s silence on the matter is deplorable.”   Goheer said the people of south Punjab were together in grief with the residents of Lahore. “We share the grief of the families of those martyred in the attack and want the government to officially declare them martyrs…we all condemn the attack.” He said an Indian spy had been arrested from Balochistan and four others from the Punjab and Karachi had been taken into custody. This had proved that India was behind the on-going of unrest and chaos in Pakistan, he said. “It is now clear that India is responsible for disturbing the peace.”  The government is yet to issue a statement regarding the arrest of Indian spies on Pakistani soil. “This proves that Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif have shady dealings going on in India.” He said if it had been a Pakistani spy arrested in India, the Indian government would come out with vociferous condemnation and would have taken the matter to the United Nations. He said the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz had been in power for the last three years but had yet to appoint a foreign minister. “Our government doesn’t even have a solid foreign policy,” he said.  Goheer said the people of the Punjab had suffered enough bloodshed. “We now demand that the government deploy Rangers in south Punjab and hold an operation similar to the one in Karachi.”

Published in The Express Tribune, March 30^th,  2016.