ISLAMABAD: Jolted by the monstrous Taliban attack on the Army Public School in Peshawar which killed more than 130 schoolchildren and 10 other people, including the principal of the school, the Senate expressed its firm resolve on Friday to destroy the banned Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and other militant groups to defend the Pakistani culture, traditions and lifestyle.

In a unanimously adopted resolution, the upper house of parliament strongly condemned the massacre of schoolchildren by the TTP terrorists and said that they now posed an existential threat to the country and therefore there was a need for ideological clarity and complete unity to fight the scourge once and for all.

The house made it clear that the attack would not weaken the resolve of the nation to fight terrorism to bring an end to these barbaric acts for good.

“If anything – it has strengthened the national resolve to fight...the TTP, all terrorists and their sympathisers and apologists,” it said. The Senate condemned all those who by acting, wittingly or unwittingly, as apologists of these insurgents were misleading the nation to weaken its resolve to finish them off.

It declared the school massacre, the responsibility of which has been claimed by the TTP, the most barbaric, atrocious, inhumane, horrifying and shocking act. It said the Peshawar incident was a grave national tragedy and stressed that it had in fact an attack on the state and society of Pakistan and its future.

The house recalled that in the past also, the Taliban and other banned terrorist organisations had targeted civilians, armed forces, police and other law-enforcement agencies. “In Peshawar they targeted the future of the country by seeking to instil fear to prevent children from seeking education,” the resolution said.

It called upon the people to unite in this hour of great national tragedy, grief and mourning and urged all people to be conceptually very clear as to who the enemy of the country was. It sought implementation in letter and in spirit of the vision of Pakistan as articulated by Quaid-i-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah in his August 11, 1947 address.

The house extended its deepest sympathies to the bereaved families of the victims of the Peshawar tragedy and asked the federal government to stand by them in their hour of grief.

At the very outset of the brief proceedings, Senate Chairman Syed Nayyar Hussain Bokhari said the house was meeting in an atmosphere of sorrow and mourning when the entire nation was in a state of grief because of the unprecedented tragedy in Peshawar.

He said it had been decided in the business advisory committee meeting that no routine proceedings would take place on Friday because of the Peshawar incident and proceedings would remain confined to a resolution condemning the attack on schoolchildren and pray for the victims of the national calamity.

He called for a practical demonstration of unity and solidarity at this crucial juncture, stressing that the country could no longer move towards an egalitarian, progressive and enlightened society in the prevailing situation of fear and insecurity.

A close aide to former president Asif Ali Zardari, Senator Abdul Qayyum Soomro, moved a motion to suspend the routine business of the house, which was adopted.

The resolution was moved by PPP leader Raza Rabbani while prayers for the departed souls of the schoolchildren and other people were led by Prof Sajid Mir.

The house will initiate the discussion on the Peshawar tragedy and the murder of former Senator of JUI-F, Khalid Mahmood Soomro, when it meets again on Monday at 3pm.

Published in Dawn December 20th , 2014