Qureshi condemns Peshawar blast

Says govt's opponents trying to create instability

HYDERABAD:

The foreign minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi while condemning the suicide blast in a Peshawar mosque has said the terrorists and the government's political opponents are trying to create instability by creating feelings of hopelessness and anxiety.

"In capacity of the foreign minister I know which powers are behind these terrorist attacks and who are providing them arms, resources and who wants to create instability in Pakistan," he stated in his address to Paksitan Tehreek-e-Insaf's Huqooq-e-Sindh march in Badin and Tando Muhammad Khan districts on Friday. He also spoke at a press conference, flanked by the federal minister Fehmida Mirza and Zulfiqar Mirza, former Sindh home minister.

He observed that the army, police and anti-terrorist courts have given sacrifices to protect lives of the people and to defeat terrorists. "But some powers can't accept this. They don't want to see stability, economic revival and growth and foreign investment in Pakistan."

Qureshi argued that the simplest way of stopping the progress is to create uncertainty among the people. He asked Sindhis understand the issue that the government's political opponents are also trying to create uncertainty so that the nation becomes worried and uncertain about their future. "They are doing this for the sake of power and to try to protect themselves from the process of accountability."

He mocked the long march of Pakistan Peoples Party which is being led by its chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, claiming that the party has failed to attract the crowd. "They thought when we would leave Sindh, a flood of people and flags of the party will accompany them to Punjab."

He said the PTI's march is an attempt to show the people of Sindh both sides of the coin because the PPP wanted to show only the one side which reflected poorly on the PTI's government. "When we showed other side of the coin to the people of Sindh, they [PPP] accelerated their march to leave Sindh early and enter Punjab."

He went on to claim that the party and its leadership has also not been received well in Punjab saying that the planned place of their rally in Multan was changed to a location in bypass because of thin attendance. "They blocked the road on the bypass to create a crowd."

Qureshi justified the successive increase of the fuel prices on the basis of a continuous trend of the price hike in the international market. "We passed it on unwillingly. But a point came when Khan realized that the people can no longer carry this burden."

The federal ports and shipping minister Ali Zaidi alleged that the PPP's Sindh government, which he described as Zardari mafia, is trying to threaten the PTI's supporters who have been taking part in their march. He accused the civil administration for acting on behest of the PPP by occupying agricultural lands of the PTI workers and registering fake FIRs against them.

"Once again with a cool mind I want to warn Bilawal that you may take out your march and no one will stop you in Punjab. But I just want to say that behave yourself." Both the minister condemned alleged attack of the PPP's workers on the media in Multan and asked the supporters of the PTI to participate in the protest which be staged by the journalists of Multan.

The federal minister Dr Fehmida Mirza recalled her and her husband Zulfiqar Mirza's service for Benazir Bhutto and that how the couple was closely associated with her. She said the PPP's incumbent leadership has failed to get justice for Benazir, 300 workers who were martyred in the terrorist attack on Benazir and the poor people of Sindh. "How will you give justice to people of Punjab."

Mirza alleged that the PPP has become infested with criminals, land grabbers and drug peddlers can be seen on their ship. She said attempts were also made to forcefully occupy their agricultural farms in Badin similar to the attempt in Nawabshah during which five men of Bhan community were killed.

 

Published in The Express Tribune, March 5^th, 2022.