ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif will chair a high-level meeting on Thursday to discuss ways of improving the implementation of the National Action Plan (NAP) to counter terrorism and extremism across the country.

The meeting will also be attended by Chief of the Army Staff General Raheel Sharif and heads of intelligence agencies. All four chief ministers, the AJK prime minister and the Gilgit-Baltistan CM have also been invited to the meeting, along with the four provincial chief secretaries.

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Sources told Dawn that progress on NAP implementation, the challenges hindering progress in certain areas and ideas to enhance the pace of actions taken for internal security would be discussed threadbare during the meeting. Important decisions about the fight against terror, national security and important national issues will also be taken.

The first round of the meeting to be held at the Prime Minister’s House will be presided over by Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan.

The interior minister had informed the cabinet about two weeks ago that 62,000 combing operations had been carried out as part of NAP and about 68,000 people arrested. He said 5,900 intelligence-based operations had been carried out and their number rose to 11,000 since the launch of operation Zarb-i-Azb. He said that 1,114 terrorists had been killed and 883 hardcore terrorists arrested. The names of 7,900 people belonging to the banned militant organisations have been placed on a watch-list, commonly known as the fourth schedule of Anti-Terrorism Act.

The minister said the number of outlawed organisations was 61, while one other organisation (Jamaatud Dawa) was currently under observation. He said 282 leaders of banned outfits had also been identified. He said all terrorist and criminal networks had been dismantled and were no longer in a position to operate from Pakistan.

According to him, the verification of 140 million SIMs was a great achievement and now they could not be used for terrorist or criminal activities.

Chaudhry Nisar said that 2,011 criminals and terrorists had been awarded capital punishment and the process continued. Work on disarming sectarian groups was under way.

He said that 28 cases had been decided by military courts, while another 46 were under trial. Nine military courts were functioning, but not as a parallel judicial system and stressed that the military courts would only try ‘jet black terrorists’.

He said the law and order situation in Karachi had improved significantly and major crimes declined by 70 per cent. The situation has also improved significantly in Balochistan, where over 500 outlaws (fararis) have surrendered so far.

However, Chaudhry Nisar conceded that the pace of implementation on choking terror financing was slow and only Rs250 million in assets had been frozen so far.

Published in Dawn, September 10th, 2015

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