ISLAMABAD - While the United Nations remains insistent in urging the member states to abolish capital punishment, it looks to have remained devoid of any practical alternative to the death penalty in the countries like Pakistan which confronts worst terrorism and ever-rising crimes.Last week, UN Human Rights Chief Navi Pillay had felt ‘disappointed’ and ‘sad’ over the first execution in four years in Pakistan. “The Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) opposes the death penalty in any circumstances and has been greatly encouraged by the lengthening moratorium on executions in Pakistan,” her spokesperson had told the media in Geneva on Friday. On the other hand, whether the UN suggests or formulates any workable mechanism to deal with the existing scenario in the states like Pakistan is a pertinent query the UN is yet to address. In recent years, Pakistan has faced unprecedented surge in terrorism, targeted killings on ethnic and sectarian basis, insurgency and increasing cases of abductions for ransom. The UN chief in Pakistan expresses his inability to comment on this subject. “The UN General Assembly has called for states that maintain the death penalty to establish a moratorium on the use of the death penalty with a view to abolition. This is the UN’s position. I cannot comment on the other issues raised in the below message,” stated Resident Coordinator Timo Pakkala in his written statement made available to this scribe in response to a couple of questions posed by TheNation.“Is it a workable option to abolish death penalty in Pakistan in the backdrop of serious security challenges, emanating out of terrorism, target killings and related crimes? What alternative does the UN suggest against death penalty?” were the queries directed to the resident coordinator.The top Pakistani officials tasked with maintaining law and order in the volatile areas of Pakistan strongly advocate imposition of death penalty on terrorists, target killers, hired assassins and others involved in life-taking crimes. “Unless the miscreants are awarded exemplary punishments, there would be no let up in terrorism and other crimes,” Capital City Police Officer in Quetta Mir Zubair Mehmood told this journalist. Quetta is one of the cities worst affected by sectarian violence and insurgency. On Wednesday, a bomb blast had reportedly killed five people in the city. “The perpetrators of this heinous crime deserve nothing but death,” the CCPO said. Peshawar Police Chief Imtiaz Altaf pointed to the weaknesses in legal system that prevented the culprits involved in heinous crimes from taking to justice. “The killers get off the hook due to lack of evidence and other legal hitches. The security agencies arrested a number of terrorists but the courts set them free due to certain legal loopholes. Pakistan cannot afford to abolish death penalty. This would amount to serving the killers interests,” he said adding that several acquitted terrorists were out to unleash terrorism again. “The only solution to this problem is: Deal with such tyrants with an iron fist. Hang a few of them so that others draw a lesson. There’s enough evidence like video footages and other documented evidence to get them hanged,” Altaf said. The Pakistani government is considering presenting a bill in the Parliament for approval to abolish the death penalty. However, several countries including India, United States, China, Japan and Iran have not abolished death penalty in order to control crime rate. Some 34 US states have kept the capital punishment intact.  “This is a tricky situation. On one hand, there have been demands for abolishing death penalty from international community but on the other hand, ground realities cannot be overlooked here,” Member National Assembly from the ruling Pakistan People’s Party and former State Minister for Law, Justice and Parliamentary Affairs Mehreen Anwar Raja told The Nation. “The developed states or the West have not confronted terrorism the way Pakistan has. We’ve been the worst victim of this menace that took precious lives numbering in thousands including our great leader Benazir Bhutto. If the bill to do away with the death sentence is presented in the Parliament, we would certainly not make any move that goes against our national interest.” Director Human rights Commission of Pakistan I.A Rehman said that the application of death penalty differed from state to state and “should not be generalised in holistic terms”. “I think that every country has a set of socio-political circumstances within which it operates. Exercising death penalty differs from state to state. This should not be generalised in holistic terms. Pakistan’s socio-political dynamics are different from other countries and it has to operate within these dynamics. All factors need to be accounted for, before touching a sensitive human rights issue as lawful executions.”During her visit to Pakistan in June this year, Navi Pillay had voiced ‘concern’ over some 8000 prisoners on death row here urging Pakistan to exercise ‘moratorium’ on death penalty. Despite these concerns, the international body is yet to come up with a concrete substitute to exercising ‘moratorium’ in the terrorism and crime-plagued developing states. As many as 110 states had voted for abolishing death sentence at a session of a UN General Assembly’s committee on Tuesday but the states such as US, Japan, China, Iran and India had opposed the resolution while Pakistan and 35 other countries had abstained from casting their votes.