Terror stems more from provinces than countries: Maryam

Calls for tighter coordination to curb cross-border threat

KARACHI:

Punjab Chief Minister Maryam Nawaz on Saturday said the province faced a greater security threat from "neighbouring provinces than from neighbouring countries", stressing that terrorism entered Punjab through its provincial borders and calling for greater coordination, intelligence sharing, and the use of modern technology to address it.

Addressing the e-launching ceremony of the AI Hub in Lahore, the chief minister said Punjab was facing a rapidly evolving security situation and vulnerabilities across several areas, including terrorism, ethnic and religious conflicts and organised crime.

"As you can see, I am from a tri-border area. I am sorry to say that the threat is less from my neighbouring countries and more from my neighbouring provinces. Terrorism comes from there to Punjab. Everyone has an eye on Punjab," she said.

She, however, described Punjab as a safe province and said the provincial government had invested billions of rupees in technology to strengthen security.

"I am happy to share that Punjab is now the most AI-enabled province and not only the most AI-enabled province, it is the most technology-enabled province," she said.

The chief minister said the AI hub would facilitate intelligence fusion, real-time information-sharing, threat anticipation and the study of emerging patterns, allowing the provincial government and law enforcement agencies to respond to potential threats before they developed into incidents.

"There is a rapidly evolving security situation in Pakistan, and there are a lot of vulnerabilities in many areas," she said, adding that the province faced not only terrorism but also ethnic and religious conflicts, organised crime and the spread of drugs.

She said federal and provincial law enforcement and intelligence agencies had worked as "one unit" in challenging situations, stressing that Punjab had consistently demonstrated a unified response.

"Whenever there is such a situation in Punjab which demands unity, which demands coordination, which demands support across the departments, Punjab has always been the only province which has a very unified response, which has a government of one unit, and all the other departments work together," she said.

Maryam said the government had strengthened checkposts and joint checkposts in the tri-border areas through technology and fortification. "When I became the Chief Minister, I saw that the most technologically advanced terrorists had night-vision cameras. They used to come with a lot of planning. Now, thanks to Allah, we have that system," she said.

She said cameras had been bulletproofed, and thermal cameras and drones had also been deployed.

"We have spent money on fortifying our check-posts and joint check-posts so that our people are safe," she said, adding that while attacks still occurred, casualties had been reduced, according to her, because of investment in technology and fortification.