ISLAMABAD, Jan 24: Acting Senate Chairman Jan Muhammad Jamali on Wednesday referred the issue of the foreign visits of Federal Minister for Petroleum and Natural Resources Amanullah Khan Jadoon and other officials of the ministry during the last five years to the standing committee concerned to examine the expenditures.

The matter was referred to the committee by Mr Jamali during the Question Hour when Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal (MMA) Senator Ismail Buledi questioned the amount of Rs8.144 million spent on 78 official foreign visits of the minister, the secretary and other officials.

Mr Buledi alleged that the ministry had provided wrong information as the amount of Rs8.144 million seemed too small if compared to the number of visits.

Minister of State for Petroleum and Natural Resources Nasir Mengal claimed that the reply was correct as he saw no reason in hiding the expenditures. He said the expenditure was low as some of the visits were sponsored by other governments.

Mr Buledi, however, said that he was not satisfied with the reply and insisted that the matter should be referred to the committee.

Earlier, in a written reply to a question of Mr Buledi, Federal Minister for Petroleum Amanullah Khan Jadoon informed the house that he had undertaken 23 foreign visits during the last five years incurring an expenditure of Rs2.767 million. He further said that 15 visits of the secretary and 40 visits of other ministry officials during the same period cost Rs1.658 million and Rs3.718 million, respectively, to the national exchequer.

In a written reply to a question of Senator Talha Mehmood, the minister told the Senate that a state-of-the-art new oil refinery with the capacity of 200,000 to 300,000 barrels per day had been planned to be set up at Khalifa Point near Hub in Balochistan by first quarter of 2011.