March, 22 2005	Tuesday	11 Safar 1426

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ISLAMABAD, March 21: Chairman of the parliamentary committee on Balochistan Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain has said that President Pervez Musharraf has given him a free hand to resolve Balochistan’s crisis through political means. Talking to newsmen after presiding over a meeting of the parliamentary committee on Monday, Chaudhry Shujaat said he had held a meeting with President Musharraf earlier in the day during which the president offered him maximum concessions and in fact went beyond the proposals submitted by the parliamentary committee for the resolution of the issue. The parliamentary committee, he said, would send a fact-finding team to Sui and Dera Bugti on Tuesday. The team would submit its findings to the committee which would discuss them on March 24.

“If I reveal the concessions which the president has offered for resolving the Balochistan imbroglio there is a fear that the press will give it a wrong twist and it will be taken as a sign of government weakness,” Chaudhry Shujaat said.

“The president asked me to take whatever steps that were needed to resolve the Balochistan issue,” Chaudhry Shujaat added.

He termed it a historic day in view of the breakthrough that he had achieved in his meeting with President Musharraf as well as in the meeting of the parliamentary committee which was also attended by Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz to provide necessary assurances and address reservations of committee members.

He said the committee had wanted to call the interior minister to provide guarantees on behalf of the government and when the matter was discussed with the prime minister, he volunteered himself to come and give assurances.

The committee members wanted assurance from the government that their recommendations would be implemented in letter and spirit which the prime minister accepted.

Chaudhry Shujaat said the committee was given assurance that no military operation was under way in any area of Balochistan nor was there any plan in this regard as the government wanted to resolve the matter politically through the parliamentary committee.

The PML chief said the government was well aware of the fate of such operations undertaken in the past as the gunfire and bombings of 1977 were still fresh in peoples’ memory.

He said the parliamentary committee meeting was deferred to March 24 on the request of members as some of them would be visiting Balochistan.

Chaudhry Shujaat said reservations of some of the committee members about the army movement were also removed and they were assured that security forces would only guard the Sui installations and there would no more force movement.

Former prime minister Mir Zafarullah Khan Jamali, who also attended the committee meeting on special invitation, said the fact-finding team would submit its report to the parliamentary committee when it resumed proceedings on Thursday.

Chaudhry Shujaat said that as many as 50 people had died in the shrine blast in Jhal Magsi and the government would arrange compensation for those killed in the incident.

Earlier, a parliamentary delegation was scheduled to visit Dera Bugti on Saturday but the visit was cancelled at the last moment after security clearance was not given for the visit. Sources said Tuesday’s visit also depended on weather conditions and security clearance from Sui.

The delegation has been expanded by including four more members from the treasury side, Senators Nisar Memon, Mohammad Ali Barohi, Mohammad Ali Durrani and Saeed Hashmi.

The MMA, PML-N and BNP have given the names of Liaquat Baloch, Hafiz Hussain Ahmed, Asadullah Bhutto, Dr Farid Paracha, Dr Ataur Rahman, Khwaja Saad Rafiq, Sardar Yaqub Nasir and Abdur Rauf Mengal, while the PPP has nominated Sherry Rehman, Qamaruz Zaman Kaira and Syed Naveed Qamar.

PML secretary-general Mushahid Hussain was present on the occasion.