ISLAMABAD: As many as 61 death row convicts have been sent to the gallows since the launch of National Action Plan (NAP) to counter terrorism in December, revealed a report on the implementation of NAP presented to Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif.

A total of 47 executions have been carried out in Punjab, 11 in Sindh, one in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and two in Azad Kashmir.

Law-enforcement agencies have arrested 32,347 individuals on various charges, including terrorism, in 28,826 operations conducted across the country since the launch of the plan. Those arrested included 727 ‘hardcore terrorists’. In addition, 37 terrorists are said to have been killed during this time.

The report presented to the PM was based on information received from the provinces between Dec 24, 2014 and March 25, 2015.

NAP implementation report presented to PM

More than half of the arrests were made in KP, while the number of arrests was lowest in Punjab. At least 8,619 arrests were made in KP, 6,467 in Sindh, 3,483 in Balochistan and 2,798 in Punjab. At least 762 persons were arrested from the federal capital, 179 from Federally Administered Tribal Areas, 30 from Gilgit-Baltistan and nine from Azad Kashmir.

Security agencies conducted 14,791 operations in Punjab, 5,517 in Sindh, 6,461 in KP, 84 in Balochistan, 405 in Islamabad, 1,394 in Azad Kashmir, 91 in Fata and 83 in Gilgit-Baltistan.

The police also arrested 3,214 people for misuse of loudspeakers in Punjab, 451 in KP, 176 in Sindh and 94 in the federal capital.

In total, 887 cases were registered for spreading hate speech and hate material, including 707 in Punjab, 83 in KP, 38 in Sindh, 46 in AJK and one in Gilgit-Baltistan. Law-enforcement agencies also arrested 918 people and sealed a total of 70 shops on these charges.

According to the report, 18,855 Afghan refugees have been deported so far. They include 5,996 from KP, 11,216 from AJK, 798 from Balochistan, 842 from Fata, two from Gilgit-Baltistan and one from Islamabad.

The Federal Investigation Agency registered 64 cases of illegal money transfer and arrested 83 people, as well as recovering over Rs100 million. Nine cases were registered over suspicious transactions while the agency also registered 57 money laundering cases and arrested 50 people on these charges.

The State Bank of Pakistan froze as many as 120 accounts with a balance exceeding Rs10 billion under NAP, with an aim to choke the funding of terrorists.

Over 59 million mobile phone SIMs have been verified by cellular companies during this period.

Published in Dawn, March 29th, 2015

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