Dr Aafia’s detention up to US: PML-N leader

Raja Farooq Haider Khan criticises calls for her release.

MIRPUR:

PML-N’s leader of the Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) chapter Raja Farooq Haider Khan said on Saturday that since Dr Aafia Siddiqi is a US citizen, the decision of her life imprisonment is ultimately up to America.

Addressing a press conference at the Kashmir Press Club, Khan, who is also a former prime minister of AJK, said that “those seeking her release should also raise a voice against the rape and torture of women by troops in Indian-held Kashmir.”

He criticised journalists who attacked Marvi Memon for calling Dr Aafia a terrorist. Memon recently quit PML-Q to join Nawaz Sharif’s faction.

Khan, who is the leader of the opposition in the AJK Legislative Assembly, said religious leaders of the area should raise a voice against the oppression on innocent women by Indian security forces in Kashmir.

Not a friendly opposition

Khan alleged that some elements were trying to oust AJK’s Prime Minister Chaudhry Abdul Majeed of the PPP. “We will not allow for any sort of in-house change that could lead to the removal of the prime minister.”

He, however, said that the opposition would continue to voice concerns against any unhealthy policies of the AJK government. He snubbed the impression that PML-N was a ‘friendly opposition’ saying that it still believed last year’s general elections were not fair and transparent.

Demanding local bodies’ elections immediately, Khan said calling for early polls was PML-N’s manifesto. He said his party would also raise the issue in the upcoming session of the AJK’s Legislative Assembly.

Khan informed that his party’s chief Nawaz Sharif will visit Mirpur on April 5, to address a rally on the eve of the founding anniversary of PML-N’s AJK chapter. “Reorganisation (of the party) in AJK is in full swing and it is all set to emerge as the single largest political force of the region.” AJK law makers belonging to PML-N, including Ch Tariq Farooq, Shoukat Ali Shah, former minister Ch Rukhsar Ahmed and PML-N’s Mirpur leader Ch Muhammad Saeed were also present on the occasion.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 18^th, 2012.