ISLAMABAD, Sept 24: The federal cabinet on Wednesday expressed concern over deteriorating law and order situation in the country and said the Marriott tragedy was the result of intelligence failure.

A meeting of the cabinet, presided over by Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani at the Prime Minister’s House, asked law-enforcement agencies to act more effectively to combat terrorism because they had ‘miserably failed’ in pre-empting the Saturday disaster, informed official sources told Dawn.

The cabinet, the sources said, desired that law-enforcement agencies must get their act together because they had failed miserably to lay hands on perpetrators of the acts of sabotage.

The prime minister himself told reporters that he had stopped his ministers from issuing statements on matters relating to law and order and said that such statements should be issued only by the information secretary.

The decision came two days after Prime Minister’s Adviser on Interior Rehman Malik and Information Minister Sherry Rehman had issued contradictory statements about the actual venue of an Iftar-dinner attended by top leadership on Saturday evening. While Mr Malik said that a last-minute change of venue from Marriott to the PM House had saved the top leadership from the suicide blast, Ms Rehman said the hotel was not the venue and the dinner had been shifted to the PM House from Parliament House at the last hour.

The prime minister reaffirmed the government’s commitment to curb terrorism and stressed the need for taking stringent measures to eradicate the menace. He said that criminals did not have any ground to stand on and they must be pursued relentlessly.

“Law of the jungle cannot be allowed to persist and we are deeply concerned about the life and property of the people of Pakistan.”

The prime minister asked the authorities concerned to arrange an in-camera briefing for cabinet members on the current situation.

The PM’s adviser on interior briefed the cabinet on measures being taken to pre-empt acts of terrorism and said that the interior ministry was working in close coordination with the provincial governments.

“The army and other law-enforcement agencies are cooperating with each other to bring the law and order situation under control,” he added.

The meeting condemned the Marriott blast and abduction of the Afghan ambassador. The cabinet was informed that a search operation had been launched to trace the missing diplomat and the scope of search would be widened, if needed.

The cabinet approved a proposal of the finance division for introducing a consolidated supervision of the financial sector by the State Bank under the Pakistan Accelerating Economic Transformation Programme.

It also approved amendments to the Anti-Money Laundering Ordinance 2007. The amendments will seek to curb financing of terrorism, expand the list of predicate offences and define money-laundering in accordance with the best international practices.

The cabinet approved a summary of the Interior Ministry regarding an agreement with the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) for helping the government review the training curriculum in order to enhance professionalism of police force.

It approved a summary for signing a visa abolition agreement with France and Guyana for holders of diplomatic and official passports.

The ratification of an agreement with Tajikistan on cooperation in combating trafficking of narcotics drugs, psychotropic substances and precursor chemicals was also approved.

The cabinet approved a summary of the revenue division for initiating dialogue with Venezuela for an agreement on avoidance of double taxation and prevention of fiscal evasion with respect to taxes on income.

It also approved the issuance of long distance international (LDI) licence to China Mobile Pakistan.