ISLAMABAD: National Health Services (NHS) Minister Saira Afzal Tarar on Tuesday said Pakistan will take up the non-issuance of visas to Pakistani politicians nominated to attend the Family Planning Summit in London with United Kingdom authorities.

In response to a question during a press conference after the Satellite Family Planning Summit in Islamabad on World Population Day, Ms Tarar said a letter would be sent to the British High Commission.

“It is not the first time that the visas were not issued by the high commission, as in the past we faced a similar problem during events held regarding polio and events of the World Health Organisation,” she said.

Meetings of the Independent Monitoring Board for Polio are held in London, but the April 2015 meeting was held in Abu Dhabi due to this issue.

Satellite summit arranged to mark World Population Day after officials were unable to travel to summit in London

“We have also decided to ask the organisers of such events that, in the future, they should hold the events in countries where visas can be obtained easily,” she said.

World Population Day is observed annually on July 11. This year, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation organised a Family Planning Summit 2017 in London and invited the health and finance ministers of 69 countries to participate.

Since health has been devolved in Pakistan, the federal finance minister and all provincial representatives were invited to the conference.

The Sindh government nominated Shahnaz Wazir Ali, who signed Family Planning 2020 (FP2020), a global partnership that supports the rights of women and girls to decide when and how many children they want to have, on behalf of Pakistan in 2012. However, a visa was not issued to her.

Ms Ali is an activist who also served as special assistant to the prime minister and chairperson of the Higher Education Commission. During the satellite summit, she told Dawn she applied for a visa well before Eidul Fitr, but the date of the summit passed and her passport was not returned to her.

“I am not the only one who has been denied the visa. The same thing happened with the ministers of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan. Punjab Finance Minister Dr Aisha Ghaus would also [have] faced the same problem, but she already had a visa so she successfully attended the summit,” she added.

“Now population has been devolved to provinces, so it was important for provinces to go there and inform the international community about their issues. I contacted the British High Commission as well as the deputy high commissioner, but they said their visa processing system was totally different and they had nothing to do with it. I will definitely write to the high commission.”

A British High Commission spokesperson said the commission does not comment on the issuance of individual visas. However, he claimed that most visas applied for by Pakistanis are issued in time.

Speaking on Population Day earlier, Ms Tarar said the increasing population was a bigger issue than terrorism.

“A couple should only have two children, because it will ensure better health facilities for the whole family. The demand of contraceptives will be raised to almost 50pc as we have signed FP2020. The province of Sindh has already made a taskforce to achieve the target by 2020,” she said.

“However, whenever we try to control the population, a religious factor arrives and the process is derailed. We need to understand that it is our issue, and we have to address it, otherwise the gap between facilities and demand will never be filled as we are among the highest growing nations in terms of population,” she added.

The head of the Population Council Track 20 Project, Khan Mohammad, told Dawn that demand has been generated for contraceptives in Pakistan, but around 20pc of people are not getting services.

“Women mostly fear side effects and some have the experience of side effects, due to which they advise each other not to go for modern contraceptives. We need to develop trust and the proper counselling of people should be done,” he said.

The Satellite Family Planning Summit included a live stream from the conference being held in the UK.

Published in Dawn, July 12th, 2017