Zardari says he saw no change in KP during PTI’s rule

Meets parents who lost children in APS attack

PESHAWAR: Pakistan People's Party (PPP) Co-chairman Asif Ali Zardari has said he didn't see the change in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa that the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) chief claimed.

Talking to reporters at a reception which the Awami National Party (ANP) central leader Haji Ghulam Ahmad Bilour hosted in his honour on Tuesday, Zardari also asked Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to read a column in the New York Times to know the facts and how the world thinks about him. Opposition leader in the National Assembly Syed Khursheed Shah, PPP's former information minister Qamar Zaman Kaira, ANP central General Secretary Mian Iftikhar Hussain, Senator Ilyas Bilour, ANP provincial General Secretary Sardar Hussain Babak, secretary information Haroon Bilour and senior lawyer Latif Afridi were also present on the occasion. Zardari recalled that he had special love with the land of the Pakhtuns and personal relations with Haji Ghulam Bilour, who he said was also his father's friend.

He said he had learnt a lot from Haji Ghulam Bilour and would do so in future also. However, he termed the talk of an election alliance with ANP as pre-mature, adding that the elections would be held after nine months.

The decision about the alliance, he added, would be made keeping in view the situation at the time. Zardari, who is former President of Pakistan, was accorded a warm welcome at the Bilour House where the PPP and ANP leadersdiscussed the political situation in the country. He also held meetings with the representatives of People's Students Federation (PSF), People's Youth Organisations (PYO) and People's Lawyers Forum (PLF).

The PYO activists staged a demonstration outside the house of PPP provincial president Humayun Khan.  Zardari held a meeting with the parents of the Army Public School (APS) martyrs at the residence of Humayun Khan. While listening to tragic stories of parents carrying pictures of their deceased children, the former president could not stop his tears.  The parents demanded judicial inquiry into the APS tragedy, Nishan-e-Haider for the deceased students and strict punishment for former spokesman of TTP.