SIALKOT: Minister for Defence, Water and Power Khawaja Asif said on Saturday that the recent drone attack has compelled Pakistan to ponder whether the US wants peace or not.
Addressing the oath-taking ceremony of the newly elected office bearers of the Sialkot Press Club, the minister said Pakistan will continue its all-out efforts to establish a durable peace in Afghanistan despite the recent US drone attack in Pakistan, adding that Islamabad had always intended to establish good relations with its neighbours.
Khawaja Asif said the US drone attack is not the failure of Pakistan’s foreign policy. However, he said this drone attack has badly affected the ongoing peace efforts in Afghanistan.
Asif said Pakistan has no objection over the development of the Chahbahar project by Iran. He said that India had not accepted the great success of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) project due to which it is trying to develop commercial and diplomatic relations with others, including Iran and Afghanistan, against Pakistan. He asked both the US and Afghanistan to show sincerity for establishing durable peace in Afghanistan and the Afghans should end the blame game in this regard.
The minister said the TTP top leaders have safe shelter places in Afghanistan and everyone knows about this fact but no international power, including the US, was ready to take action against these safe havens. He said the TTP leaders including Mullah Fazlullah were hatching conspiracies from the safe havens in Afghanistan to destabilise Pakistan with the help of India.
Asif said that several international powers including India don’t want to see the CPEC project successful which would open new vistas of socio-economic and human development in Pakistan. He said India and other international powers are creating seen and unseen hurdles in the way of the CPEC project as well. He said that despite all the hurdles the CPEC project was moving ahead towards the goal of great success and the fruits of the CPEC would start reaching the Pakistani nation very soon.
He asked the neighbours and the other countries of the region to contact Pakistan for getting linked with the CPEC. The minister said Pakistan is keeping all its options open over the burning issue of the giving or not giving of the F-16 planes to Pakistan by the US.
Asif said the PML-N government had made the defence of Pakistan hard to beat. He said the prevailing security situation is getting better day by day in Pakistan. He said the present security situation was far better than the security situation which had been there in Pakistan several years ago.
He said the atomic capacity has now become the beigest guarantee of safety and strong defence of Pakistan. He said Nawaz Sharif had given the country identification as a nuclear power by ignoring the mounted international and western pressures in this regard.
Asif said Pakistan was confronting several inner and outer dangers and met several unmatched big success against terrorism. He said the government was committed to weed out terrorism from Pakistan, adding that the Zarb-e-Azb operation will continue till the last terrorist is eliminated.
