LAHORE: The Cecil and Iris Chaudhry Foundation (CICF) commemorated the ill-fated Army Public School Peshawar attack when innocent lives were brutally lost in Peshawar.

Speaking on the occasion, Michelle Chaudhry, president of CICF, said: “They hit at the heart of the nation; the wound is too deep to heal, but we continue to fight back. We buried our children; but we did not bury our resilience; we persistently fight back and will emerge stronger; we will not allow innocent blood to go in vain.”

“However, we question the ineffectiveness of the 20-point National Action Plan that was established to curb terrorism in totality; furthermore the National Counter Terrorism Authority, which is supposed to be overseeing all policy and coordination related to counter-terrorism matters, continues to remain dysfunctional. We continue to remind the state to fulfil its promise of safeguarding the life and property of every single citizen.” Michelle added.

“As we pay tributes to all those we lost on that dreadful day in Peshawar, we also remember all the innocent lives we have lost to terrorism, religious hatred and intolerance; let us pledge to do our honest bit every single day to ensure that we don’t lose anyone anymore to this bigoted mindset,” she further said.

Published in Dawn, December 17th, 2015