MULTAN: Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi said on Sunday that he had invited leaders of all opposition parties, including Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari and Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) president Shahbaz Sharif, for a dialogue on national security.

Talking to reporters here, he said he had asked political leaders of the country that they should be united for the sake of national security.

“All political parties should be united on national security and I have invited all of them,” he said, adding that keeping in view the challenges the country was facing today the unity of the political leadership was the need of the hour.

The foreign minister said that the devaluation of Pakistani rupee against US dollar would cause price hike in the country. But there was a need to determine who had stopped the dollar from “reaching its actual value,” he said in reference to claims by some Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf’s (PTI) leaders that the previous PML-N government had artificially stopped the devaluation of the local currency.

Promises all-out efforts for creation of south Punjab province

Mr Qureshi said that creation of a south Punjab province was not merely a slogan, rather it was the need of hour.

“We have made a promise for the creation of south Punjab province and we will make all-out efforts to achieve this goal. The PTI leadership is making sincere efforts in this regard as running a province of 120 million people is not any easy task,” he added.

He said the PPP and PML-N, which were traditional rivals in Multan for long, were in cahoots with each other in a bid to defeat the PTI in the Sunday’s by-election for provincial assembly’s constituency PP-218 (Multan).

“People are raising the voice against these cahoots. Voters are more mature as compare to politicians,” he added.

Praising Foreign Secretary Tehmina Janjua who is going to retire on April 16, Mr Qureshi said that she was a person full of wisdom. “I have been working with her for seven months and I have learnt a lot from her,” he said, adding that everyone in the Foreign Office appreciated the performance of Ms Janjua.

He said the National Account­ability Bureau (NAB) was an independent institution and the government neither interfered in its affairs today, nor it would do so ever in future.

He said that Prime Minister Imran Khan was not in favour of a “deal or dheel”, rather he wanted accountability of all those who had looted the nation’s wealth.

Mr Qureshi said that during a meeting with the prime minister recently, leaders of opposition parties in the Sindh Assembly had expressed reservations over the performance of the provincial government. They had requested PM Khan to ask the Sindh chief secretary and the inspector general of police to decide matters on merit, he added.

The foreign minister claimed that the PPP government in Sindh had released development funds of Rs200 million to each of its provincial legislators. He said the PTI allies in Sindh had accused the provincial government of misusing of the funds for the Benazir Income Support Programme.

Mr Qureshi said that he had no objection over naming an institution after the name of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto. Rather, he added, he was not in favour of changing the name of the Benazir Income Support Programme.

Published in Dawn, April 1st, 2019