Raheel got NoC to lead counterterrorism alliance, Senate told

ISLAMABAD: Defence Minister Khurram Dastgir Friday said NoC was given to Gen (R) Raheel Sharif to lead the alliance, which is meant to facilitate member countries in countering terrorism effort.

During question hour at the Senate, he said this replying to questions by PPP’s Senator Farhatullah Babar. He said, “The mandate of the coalition is related to counterterrorism domain only and is aimed at facilitating member countries in countering terrorism and focusing on domains like intelligence-sharing, countering terrorist financing, capacity building for counter-terrorism effort only and conventional operations do not fall in the purview of this coalition.”

The minister said so far no army personnel had been posted. The response to a question by Senator Babar whether NoC issued to Raheel for his appointment in the coalition could be revoked, if so required, was awaited.

In reply to another question of Senator Babar, the minister confirmed that certain violations were pointed out before approval of comprehensive policy regarding the use of land by the military and the same were condoned by the federal cabinet as one-time measure. It is about use of A-1 land for welfare and other projects of the armed forces-2008.

He said that there were two policies in practice on use of the land (conversion policy). Old Grant Conversion Policy is policy for conversion of properties held on old grant/Cantt. Code leases into regular leases under CLA Rules 1937 was introduced in 1996 with the approval of the federal cabinet, he said. 

In suspension of all government orders and instructions issued on the subject, the policy was modified in 2007 in the overall interest of general public with effect from January 2008 to December 31, 2012 with the approval of Prime Minister, he said.

“Another extension in the policy was also granted by Prime Minister with effect from January 2015 to December 31, 2016. At present, a case is under consideration of Finance Division to take up case with Prime Minister Secretariat for further extension in the conversion policy,” he said.

With the approval of the federal cabinet, a policy on use of A-1 land for commercial cum welfare activities by the armed forces and CSD was issued in 2008, he said. All welfare related activities undertaken so far on A-1 lands are governed by this policy, he added. Past usage of A-1 land was condoned as a one-time measure.

Asked whether the change and revision in that policy was brought in through an executive order or an act of parliament, the minister said that the old conversion policy was brought in with the approval of federal cabinet and extended as per the President and Prime Minister’s directives.

The minister added the policy on use of A-1 land was still same in field and not had been revised so far.  Earlier, the question hour remained suspended for nearly half and hour after Chairman Mian Raza Rabbani at the start of it, wondered, who would reply to 33 questions pertaining to the Ministry of Interior. He was informed by his staff that as the federal minister was not around, the minister of state would reply to the questions. However, he was also not present in the House.

Rabbani was annoyed by absence of ministers to answerquestions and suspended proceedings for 15 minutes. Rabbani asserted was not it so that the ministers were obstructing the business of the Senate and should not be exercising his powers, ask the Minister of State (Talal Chaudhry, who had arrived in the Senate during its suspension) to leave the House. He said that he could even suspend a minister for an entire next session. He lamented that the ministers would come to the House at will.

Rabbani then deferred the related questions. Minister for State and Frontier Regions Abdul Qadir Baloch told the House that no final date could be given about repatriation of Afghan refugees and that 1.4 million of them had been registered and documentation of the rest would be completed in two three months. he added last year, 6,40000 Afghan refugees had been repatriated and that the UNHCR decision to increase financial support from 200 dollars to 400 dollars played an important part in it.