Quashing doubts: Mullah Omar didn’t die in Pakistan, says Asif

Defence minister says that Pakistan wants Kabul-Taliban peace talks to continue

ISLAMABAD:

Defence Minister Khawaja Asif on Friday laid to rest speculation set off by Afghanistan’s intelligence agency about the final resting place of the late supreme leader of the Afghan Taliban, insisting that Mullah Omar had neither died in Pakistan nor was he buried there.

“I can confirm that Mullah Omar neither died nor was buried in Pakistan,” he told lawmakers in response to a point made by the Pakistan Peoples Party’s MNA Naveed Qamar in the National Assembly.

The controversy rose after Afghanistan’s National Directorate of Security’s spokesman Abdul Hassib Seddiqi had recently said that Mullah Omar died in a Pakistani hospital near the city of Karachi in 2013.

The defence minister said: “Whether he died now or two years ago is another controversy which we do not wish to be a part of.” He refuted Afghan spy agency’s claims that the Taliban supremo died in a hospital in Karachi. “He [Mullah Omar] was neither in Karachi nor in Quetta. We totally deny this claim.”

‘Role of mediator’

Pakistan is only playing the role of a mediator in talks between Afghan Taliban and the government in Kabul, Khawaja Asif said, adding, “We do not accept that we have a control on Taliban, we are only playing the role of mediator.”

According to him, American and Chinese officials are participating in the Pakistan-brokered peace talks as observers. “We do not want to get involved in any rivalry in the Taliban leadership. Pakistan only wants the two groups’ leadership to continue the reconciliation process.”

The second round of talks, which was scheduled to take place on July 31 in Pakistan, was postponed at the request of the Afghan government and Taliban leadership.

All allegations that Pakistan had been facing should now be washed out, he maintained. “This is our wish, if we clean it successfully, we will be grateful to God.”

Speaking on the floor of the lower house of parliament, Asif said, “When Mullah Omar died? Who killed him? We did not have any knowledge about it?” In the same breath he said that his [Taliban’s supremo] relatives and family members said he died of natural causes in Qandhar, Afghanistan and was buried there.”

At a time when the fate of the nascent peace process looks shaky following the issue of their leadership, he said, “Whichever their leadership is, we will try to convince them for talks.”

Calling attention notice

Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs Shaikh Aftab Ahmad informed lawmakers that a committee is reviewing a package for some secretariat employees to give maximum facilities to their family members.

He was responding to a calling attention notice moved by MNA Asiya Naz Tanoli regarding non-regularisation of the services of the deceased employees’ children working in the secretariat.

Responding to another calling attention notice moved by MNA Sufyan Yusuf and others regarding non-implementation of 5% quota in jobs for non-Muslims, the state minister told the house that the quota is being strictly implemented.

Letters have also been written to ministries, divisions and departments to implement the job quota for non-Muslims, he added.


Published in The Express Tribune, August 8^th, 2015.