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Thursday March 28, 2024

APC, joint sitting on Yemen crisis sought

Opposition parties’ meeting chaired by Zardari declares decision on issue can’t be taken unilaterally

By our correspondents
April 02, 2015
KARACHI: The opposition parties in a meeting chaired by Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) Co-Chairperson Asif Ali Zardari called upon the government to convene a joint session of parliament and an All Parties Conference (APC) to deliberate upon the Yemen crisis and the possible Pakistan stance on the issue, as an individual had no authority to take a decision in this regard.
The leaders of the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP), Awami National Party (ANP), Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) and Balochistan National Party-Awami (BNP-A) held a meeting here at Bilawal House to discuss the evolving situation in Yemen and in the rest of the Middle Eastern and their implications for Pakistan.
Leaders of the main opposition political parties held a discussion on the Yemen situation in the backdrop of a debate on whether Pakistani should send troops to Saudi Arabia and take part in the operation launched by the Saudi-led coalition forces.
The participants of the meeting expressed grave concern over the situation in Yemen and its implications for the region and also for Pakistan. They were of the view that by convening an APC and a joint session of parliament on the Yemen issue, the government would take the entire nation into confidence.
Expressing concern over recent developments, the opposition leaders said that the stability and integrity of the Gulf and of all the countries in the Middle East was of paramount importance and called for resolving the present crisis through dialogue and negotiations. The meeting expressed the firm belief that the centrality of Saudi Arabia was pivotal for the Muslims and that “Our responseshould reflect this belief”.
The meeting stated that the gravity of the issue demanded that no individual should take any decision on the Yemen issue without broad-based discussion and consultation with all the political parties and stakeholders concerned. The joint declaration adopted at the meeting was read out later to media at a press conference by PPP leader Sherry Rehman.
Speaking at the press conference, Asif Ali Zardari said that they wanted to take along Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) for consultation on the issue. He said the PPP had always promoted culture of dialogue on national issues whether party was in power or in opposition as the party always strived for finding a way out to every problem through negotiations. He said the stability of the entire region had been jeopardized due to the Yemen issue. “It is a situation like the entire Islamic world engulfed with fire as we are all under obligation to play their part for resolving the situation,” said the former president.
He said that hundreds of thousands of Pakistanis had been present in Saudi Arabia and in the rest of Gulf region for whose safety and security and that of the entire region, all the quarters concerned had to sit together for negotiations.
He said that Pakistan was required to go to any extent or to any boundary for the sake of peaceful and permanent settlement of the persisting issue. To a question, the former president said Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had never taken the initiative to telephone him (Zardari) on any national issue while he himself had always taken the initiative whenever any such need had arisen for peaceful settlement of the problems.
The PPP co-chairman said that he had so far not been consulted (by the government) on the issue of Yemen but he wished that people’s viewpoint should be heard on the situation.To another question, Zardari said that during the time he had been serving as president of the country he had talked to the governments of Saudi Arabia and Iran for mediation and resolution of the issues persisting between the two countries but later on after his tenure as president had ended, he had not so far talked to any of the quarters concerned on the persisting regional issue.
He said the government was required to adopt a long-term policy for improvement of situation in Middle East.Speaking on the occasion, ANP chief Asfandyar Wali said that had there been a general in power, he would have taken the decision unilaterally. He said the politicians had done consultation with one another on the issue while they had been constantly reviewing the situation while the policy on the problem would be devised after due process of consultation.
MQM leader Farooq Sattar said that Yemen crisis had not been just concerning the region but in actual it was the problem of the entire Islamic world and rest of the globe. He said the entire nation had been concerned about the Yemen issue as the national policy on the issue should be clarified for the public at the earliest. The meeting was attended by ANP chief Asfandyar Wali, MQM’s Farooq Sattar, JUI-F’s Rashid Mahmood Soomro and BNP-A’s Israrullah Zehiri along with their aides.