Structured dialogue: Pakistan MPs to engage with US counterparts

Meeting aims to strengthen legislative ties and form new relationships.

A delegation of Pakistani parliamentarians will participate in the US-Pakistan Legislators Dialogue Forum in Washington DC on April 11-17, said a press release.

The 14-memebr team will join their US counterparts under the co-chairmanship of Senator Aitzaz Ahsan and MNA Sardar Awais Ahmad Khan Leghari. The delegation comprises Senators Farhatullah Babar, Hasil Khan Bizenjo and MNAs Aasiya Nasir, Ghazi Gulab Jamal, Muhammad Afzal Khan, Nafeesa Inayatullah Khan Khattak, Naveed Qamar, Omar Ayub Khan, Sanjay Perwani, Shafqat Mahmood, Shaza Fatima Khawaja, and Shazia Marri.

The purpose of the forum is to initiate structured dialogue and improve mutual understanding as both countries recalibrate the strategic relationship during the US drawdown from Afghanistan, and discuss each other’s concerns and priorities going forward.

The forum specifically aims to strengthen legislative ties and form new relationships as a complement and balance to longstanding military and executive-ministerial ties.

The forum will help broaden the relationship beyond the traditional areas of cooperation such as security and economic cooperation to explore areas such as trade, investment, education, and democratic governance, and enable participating legislators to identify and support business, civil society, and public-private partnerships that benefit their constituencies and their countries.

During the six-day forum, the Pakistan team will interact with members of the US House of Representatives and the Senate. Meetings and interactions on the sidelines include interaction with the US-Pakistan Business Council, the US Agency for International Development (USaid) and the United States Institute for Peace (USIP), among others.

The forum is an independent initiative facilitated by the Convergence Centre of Policy Resolution, the Consensus Building Institute in the US and PILDAT in Pakistan with support from the United States Institute of Peace. Pakistani MPs attended a series of briefings in Islamabad before departure including by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Pakistan and the US embassy.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 11^th, 2015.