May 8, 2003	Thursday	Rabi-ul-Awwal 5, 1424

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ISLAMABAD, May 7: Prime minister Mir Zafarullah Khan Jamali has expressed his desire to convene an early session of parliament to discuss India’s offer of peace talks and Islamabad’s response, to reach a consensus on the matter, provided the combined opposition gives up its protest against the Legal Framework Order.

This was stated by MMA leader Liaquat Baloch at a news conference after his meeting with the prime minister here on Wednesday.

Mr Baloch said he had assured the premier that the opposition would soon hold a meeting to consider the Pakistan offer and it wanted a full-scale debate on Pakistan- India relations with special reference to Pakistan’s policy on Kashmir in parliament.

Mr Baloch said he had invited the attention of the prime minister towards serious financial difficulties which the MMA government in the NWFP was facing chiefly because of inordinate delay in the disbursement of funds to the province from the federal government.

He said he had asked the premier to direct the finance ministry and water and Wapda officials to sit with a team of MMA lawmakers and provincial representatives to reconcile the accounts. He said this team would also explain to the federal institutions the hardships that the province had been experiencing because of the delays in the disbursement of funds.

Mr Baloch said that after agreeing to the payment of Rs9 billion during the year from province’s annual share in net profit income of hydropower generation under Article 161 of the Constitution, the federal government had paid only Rs1.5 billion in the first six months.