ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s National Assembly on Thursday passed a constitutional amendment bill allowing the merger of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) with Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KPK) province.
This despite opposition from two government-allied parties: Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam Fazal (JUI-F) and the Pukhtoonkhwa Milli Awami Party (PkMAP).
“This issue needed a national consensus, and thank God we achieved it today,” Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi told the National Assembly after the passage of the bill.
The merger will greatly impact development in FATA, which borders restive Afghanistan, he said.
“This is the beginning of the process,” he added. “We have to win the trust of the people of FATA, and we can achieve it through infrastructure development in the area.”
Abbasi announced a tax exemption for FATA for the next five years, and promised a 100-billion-rupee ($864-million) special infrastructure development package.
“We need to build hospitals, schools and roads in FATA to bring it at par with other parts of the country,” he said.
The government required a two-thirds majority (228 votes) in the Lower House to pass the bill, and got the support of all opposition parties.
The bill will become law after it is passed by a two-thirds majority in the Senate, and by the KP Assembly.
The bill envisages the abolition of Frontier Crimes Regulations (FCR) — a special set of colonial laws that governs FATA — and representation in the KP Assembly.
The assembly will have an additional 21 seats from FATA “provided that elections to the aforesaid seats shall be held within one year after the general elections 2018.”
JUI-F legislator Naeema Kishwar said her party had asked Abbasi to hold a referendum in FATA. The merger “will not augur well for Pakistan” as it is fulfilling a “foreign agenda,” she added.
The government allocated 100 billion rupees for FATA in last year’s budget, but only 10 billion were released, she said.
“How can we trust the government that it will fulfil all its promises of development in the tribal area?” she asked.
PkMAP legislator Abdul Qahar Khan Wadan said the people of FATA want a separate province, not a merger with KP. “We will fight for our rights, as the government has betrayed us,” he added.
Pakistan's National Assembly passes bill to merge FATA with KPK
Pakistan's National Assembly passes bill to merge FATA with KPK
- Government supported by all opposition parties but opposed by two allies.
- The bill was passed despite opposition from two government-allied parties.
Sri Lanka hospital releases 22 rescued Iranian sailors
- Sri Lankan authorities said the survivors from the Dena were being handled according to international humanitarian law
COLOMBO: Sri Lanka discharged from hospital 22 Iranian sailors who were plucked from life rafts after their warship was sunk by a US submarine, officials said Sunday.
The sailors were treated at Karapitiya Hospital in the southern port city of Galle since Wednesday after the IRIS Dena was torpedoed just outside Sri Lanka’s territorial waters.
“Another 10 are still undergoing treatment,” a medical officer at the hospital told AFP.
He said the bodies of 84 Iranians retrieved from the Indian Ocean were also at the hospital.
Those discharged from hospital overnight had been taken to a beach resort in the same district.
Sri Lankan authorities said the survivors from the Dena were being handled according to international humanitarian law, and the government had contacted the International Committee of the Red Cross for assistance.
The island is also providing safe haven for another 219 Iranian sailors from a second ship, the IRIS Bushehr, that was allowed to berth a day after the Dena was sunk.
Sailors from the Bushehr have been moved to a Sri Lanka Navy camp at Welisara, just north of the capital Colombo, and their ship taken over by Sri Lanka’s navy.
Sri Lanka announced it was taking the Bushehr to the north-eastern port of Trincomalee, but an engine failure and other technical and administrative issues had delayed the movement, a navy spokesman said.
Sri Lanka has denied claims that it was under pressure from Washington not to allow the Iranians to return home, and said Colombo will be guided solely by international law and its own domestic legislation.
A US State Department spokesperson said the disposition of the Bushehr crew and Iranian sailors rescued at sea was up to Sri Lanka.
“The United States, of course, respects and recognizes Sri Lanka’s sovereignty in the handling of this situation,” the spokesperson told AFP in Washington.
India, meanwhile, said Saturday that it had allowed a third Iranian warship, the IRIS Lavan, to dock in one of its ports on “humane” grounds after it too reported engine problems.
The three ships were part of a multi-national fleet review held by India before the war in the Middle East started last week.
“I think it was the humane thing to do, and I think we were guided by that principle,” Indian Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar said on Saturday.
The Lavan docked in the south-west Indian port of Kochi on Wednesday.
“A lot of the people on board were young cadets. They have disembarked and are in a nearby facility,” Jaishankar said.
