RAWALPINDI: Azad Kashmir President Sardar Abdul Qaiyum met President Z.A. Bhutto here today [May 30], and the crisis situation in Azad Kashmir was “amicably settled”, a statement issued by the Azad Kashmir Government said. The statement said that in the “important meeting” President Bhutto and Sardar Qaiyum discussed the situation in Azad Kashmir and “the crisis that had assumed a grave shape during the past few days. The situation was settled amicably”. The Azad Kashmir President … has advised his partymen and students to “call off strikes and demonstrations, and go back to normal life.” — News agencies

[Meanwhile, as reported by news agencies from Quetta,] the National Awami Party President, Mr Abdul Wali Khan ... said that his party would exert full political pressure on the present rulers of the country for an amicable political settlement of the “political crisis” in Baluchistan. The NAP chief … urged that all outstanding political issues must be solved by political means. Mr Wali Khan charged that women and children were being “arrested by the authorities, and even shop-keepers have been ordered not to sell as much as a match box to the besieged Baluch tribesmen in the Marri Hills”.

Published in Dawn, May 31st, 2023