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PESHAWAR, Dec 10: A US Congress delegation visited Pakistan-Afghan border at Torkham in the Khyber Agency on Friday, officials said.
The delegation comprising Mike Pence, Jeff Flake, Lincoln Davis, Chris Chocola, Jonathen Scharfen, Council chief, and David Abramowitz, Minority Council of the House International Relations Committee chief, was briefed at Michni post about the security situation in the tribal areas by Security Chief (Fata) Mahmood Shah.
Earlier the delegation called on Governor Iftikhar Hussain Shah and discussed matters of common interests, said a handout. The governor highlighted various measures being taken by the government to remove social deprivation of the people of Fata and said that though development activities were underway especially in the field of education, the socio-economic backwardness was high and would take time to bring them at par with comparatively developed areas of the country.
GRANTS: The second round of grants for the USAID-funded district grants programme in the NWFP was launched at a ceremony held here on Friday. The district grants programme is a project of the USAID and is implemented by the Rural Support Programme Network (RSPN) and its provincial chapter, the Sarhad Rural Support Programme (SRSP).
The objective of the programme is to find ways of involving private sector, communities, civil society and different tiers of the district governments to work together.
SRSP chief executive officer Masoodul Mulk explained that the system of public private partnership had been developed to make the business community and well-to-do segments of the society understand their responsibilities and contribute.
In the case of the NWFP the absence of big businesses and industries restricted the scope for such ventures. But the project would make it possible for small entrepreneurs and businesspersons to contribute their share to the project.
