ISLAMABAD: Amid opposition pressure to revisit what was termed an outdated foreign policy, the government told the National Assembly on Tuesday that the troubled plan to build a gas pipeline to bring natural gas from Iran to Pakistan was still a priority, although it was seeking concessions to make the project “practicable for us”.

The Prime Minister’s Adviser on Foreign Affairs and National Security, Sartaj Aziz, gave an overview of the government’s foreign policy goals at the end of a debate on an opposition lawmaker’s motion, rejecting allegations of compromising national interests, particularly in dealing with the pipeline project finalised with the sanctions-hit Iran by the previous PPP-led government in its last days, relations with the United States and India and an alleged pro-rebel shift in policy over the Syrian crisis.

As a pall of gloom from Monday’s terrorist killing spree at Islamabad’s district court complex still hung over the capital, the government came under renewed opposition pressure to make a quick choice between resuming a suspended peace dialogue with Taliban rebels and using military force to eradicate their bases in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata).

On what was a private members’ day, the house also saw a unique move to investigate lawmakers’ morals following some highly provocative allegations made by a mercurial independent member about their life at Islamabad’s parliamentary lodges and what turned out to be a pointless debate over a demand by four members of a religious party for the grant of interest-free loans to federal government employees.

“The gas pipeline (with Iran) is still our priority,” Mr Aziz said about the project whose Iranian portion has already been built though work on the Pakistani portion worth an estimated $1.3 billion is yet to begin.

He dismissed the allegation of PPP member Shazia Marri that Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s government had succumbed to US pressure to renege on the agreement signed last year with Iran by then president Asif Ali Zardari to mitigate Pakistan’s natural gas shortages.

But the adviser cited problems due to a short 18-month deadline given to Pakistan to build its side of the pipeline or pay penalties and existing US financial sanctions imposed on Iran for its nuclear programme.

However, he said that in view of ongoing negotiations between Iran and the US to resolve Western objections to the Iranian nuclear programme, “we are asking Iran” to relax the deadline for the completion of the project and make “changes in price” to be paid to Iran “so that the project becomes practicable for us”.

Mr Aziz also referred to a planned visit to Iran by Prime Minister Sharif, but gave no dates.

The adviser, who cited four basic objectives of the government’s foreign policy vision – strengthening Pakistan’s own security without interference in others’ affairs, least economic dependence on others, taking advantage of Pakistan’s favourable geographical location and improving internal situation to end isolation -- denied that Pakistan was giving “one-way concessions” to India in a new trade deal and providing arms to Saudi Arabia to be supplied to Syrian rebels.

But the veteran former bureaucrat spoke softly to counter opposition allegations, contrary to a recent outburst by foreign ministry spokesperson Tasneem Aslam who called into question the “intelligence level” of the critics of the government’s Syria policy, provoking an opposition privilege motion in the Senate.

Opposition leader Khursheed Ahmed Shah urged the government to brook no more delay in deciding whether it would counter terrorism though dialogue or use force and ridiculed Monday’s statement in the house in his absence by Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan that the government side had asked the Taliban to trace the group responsible for the gun and bomb attack in Islamabad that killed 11 people, including a judge and some lawyers, and suggested, rather derisively, that the minister better add the Taliban to his present list of 26 intelligence agencies working in the country.

Regretting that the prime minister had not yet followed through on his recent promise in the house to consult all opposition parties about his future course of action vis-à-vis terrorism, he warned the government that any more delay in taking a decision one way or the other would “plunge us in more difficulty”.

Earlier, on a government motion, Speaker Sardar Ayaz Sadiq set up a committee of seven house members from different parties to investigate the allegations levelled by Jamshed Ahmed Dasti about ‘immoral’ activities of unidentified lawmakers living in parliamentary lodges located near the Parliament House, giving it 15 days to submit a report.

Several lawmakers of the opposition Jamaat-i-Islami and Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf and government-allied Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam-F cried themselves hoarse to plead for the elimination of interest-based economic activities as they spoke on a resolution moved by four Jamaat members demanding provision of interest-free loans to federal government employees. Opposition to the move came only from two members of the PML-N -- Parliamentary Secretary for Finance Rana Afzal Khan on grounds of the demand being redundant in view of existing facilities for government employees and from Qaiser Ahmed Sheikh who called for an interpretation of the religious edict in light of the present-day economy when currency values fell frequently and nobody would like to bear huge losses when, for instance, the real value of a Rs100,000 loan would come to its one-tenth 10 years later.

Despite expected opposition from most members of the ruling party and the PPP, the speaker avoided a showdown with religious parties by ruling against putting the resolution to vote after the parliamentary secretary told the house that the government was already not charging interest on loans extended to employees in grades 1-15 to meet requirements like buying a bicycle and to all up to grade 22 for loans given from their provident fund account if they would forgo interest on their fund.