KARACHI, May 18: The City Council on Wednesday in a unanimously adopted resolution expressed its concern over the desecration of the Holy Quran at Guantánamo Bay, and over the cartoon published in Washington Times. It urged the government of Pakistan to reconsider its relations with the USA.

In the meeting chaired by the City Naib-Nazim, Tariq Hasan, at the City Council hall, members supported the resolution adopted in the national and provincial assemblies, and hoped the government of Pakistan would take appropriate measures to see that such incidences did not occur in the future.

“We hope our government will inform the USA government about the grievance of Muslims in Pakistan and ask it to play its role in this regard,” one member said.

Earlier, around 25 members of the council discussed their suggestions, which they had presented to the budget committee and urged to include them in the budget. Sajjad Dara, Najmi Alam, Siddique Rathore, Engineer Abdul Aziz, Abdul Rasheed Baig, Mehfooz ul Nabi, Muslim Pervaiz and others spoke on the topic.

They urged that all suggestions be sent to concerned EDOs of the city government, who would scrutinize them for implementation and cite reasons if they cannot be included in the budget.

Chairman of the Budget Committee Siddique Rathore complained non-cooperation of the EDO Finance and protested on his behaviour. “The City Council is unacceptable to the bureaucracy as the supreme authority and it creates hurdles in its way,” he told.

Some members opined that the committee should be given more time to finalize its proposals, and strict action should be taken against officials not cooperating with the committee members.

A few members also lodged protests over the shortage of water in many areas of the city including Lyari, Keamari and others.

Naib Nazim Tariq Hasan in his ruling said all suggestions would be sent to the concerned city government officials, who would submit their remarks by May 25 after scrutinizing them technically.—PPI