January 18, 2006	Wednesday	Zilhaj 17, 1426

KARACHI, Jan 17: The Sindh High Court Bar Association urged the Pakistan government on Tuesday to approach the United Nations against violation of its territory and sovereignty by the US forces.

The SHCBA held an emergency meeting under the chairmanship of the association’s president, M Ilyas Khan, and ‘condemned in the strongest terms barbaric, unlawful and immoral’ air strikes on innocent civilians by the US forces in the Bajaur area, resulting in wanton killings of non-combatants, including women and children. The strikes violate, among other norms and principles of international law, Article 2 (4) of the UN Charter, which outlaws threat or use of force against territorial integrity and sovereignty by states in dealing with one another.

The resolution also condemned US Senator John McCain’s threat implied in his remarks on the air strikes. Instead of regretting the attack, the senator said,” I can’t tell you that we wouldn’t do the same thing again”, it noted. The association urged the government to invoke Article 39 of the UN Charter and request the member states and the Security Council to take measures to prevent future attacks.

PBC, SBC MEMBERS: Pakistan Bar Council member Mohammad Yasin Azad and Sindh Bar Council members Mustafa Lakhani, Mohammad Aqil and Sadiq Hidayatullah, meanwhile, deplored that the attacks were carried out at the behest of an intelligence agency (CIA), which is otherwise known for carrying out covert operations. If agencies were allowed to violate the territorial sanctity and integrity of states, there would be complete chaos in the inter-state relations, they warned.

They urged the government to take pre-emptive measures as the US forces had not only owned the attack, but justified it on the pretext of war against terror and expressed their resolve to repeat their aggression if the situation, in their view, so warranted.