ISLAMABAD - Former Interior Minister, Senator Rehman Malik, on Friday said that Prime Minister Imran Khan’s ego was not bigger than the Mach massacre.
Speaking to journalists here, the Pakistan People’s Party leader said, the PM should “give up his ego” and visit Hazara as mourning families of martyrs were waiting for him.
The Chairman Senate Standing Committee on Interior participated in the sit-in protest against the Mach tragedy here. Malik said, the tragedy of Mach wherein eleven miners of the Hazara community had been killed mercilessly, hurt every Pakistani.
He said Mach tragedy was a highly barbaric act of terrorism that had shaken the entire nation. He added, “I have come to express my heartfelt condolence and solidarity with the families of the martyrs of Hazara community.”
The PPP leader said that thousands of men, women, and children were protesting along with coffins of their loved ones in extremely harsh weather of minus 8 degrees Celsius in Quetta demanding the visit of the Prime Minister. He said, without any further delay the Prime Minister while keeping aside his ego should reach Quetta to console the mourning community. Senator Malik said he was the first one who pointed out the presence of ISIS in Pakistan years back, but successive governments had been refusing to accept its presence just as a policy.
The lawmaker said, he had always been advocating that rather than remain in the state of denial “we should accept that Daesh was very much present in Pakistan.” He said that Daesh handlers recruited over 80,000 Pakistanis mostly from south Punjab and the recent ouster of Pakistani Daesh operators from Syria would be a great threat to the country. He further said that the way Hazara miners had been slaughtered showed the Daesh involvement as cutting the throat was the job of ISIS. “I have said it earlier also that there is a conspiracy against the Shia community,” he added.
Senator Malik said that he as Interior Minister had faced the same situation when on 10 January 2013, 130 Shia Hazara were killed in a brutal suicide attack in Quetta that led the Shia community to protest.
He said that mourners had refused to bury the dead bodies of martyrs until their demands were not met. He expressed that without wasting any time, he flew in C-130 to Iran and met the Iranian President, Supreme Leader, Foreign Minister, and also his counterpart and sought their help to convince Shia clerics in Pakistan to bury the dead bodies adding resultantly the dead bodies were buried after fulfilling their demands. He said, the present government should assess the sensitivity of the matter and situation and resolve it immediately. He urged the Prime Minister to visit Quetta with senior members of his cabinet as the families of the martyrs were looking at him for assurance of their life protection.
Senator Malik also demanded the government to announce the constitution of a judicial commission with its members from each provincial high court to probe into the Mach tragedy to fix the responsibilities that such tragedy could be prevented in the future.
He said, it was a serious issue and there should be no politics over human tragedies and sufferings. He said Imran Khan was the Prime Minister of every community in Pakistan. Senator Malik said that foreign forces were trying to cause Shia, Sunni riots in Pakistan but both the sects knew well that it was enemies’ conspiracy.
He told that ISIS had opened its bases in India and Afghanistan to operate in Pakistan as ISIS had become very active against the Muslim Ummah and particularly the Shia community, adding that all Pakistanis were equal and had the same rights. He urged government to launch stringent action against ISIS and its facilitators in Pakistan.
Malik said police and law enforcement agencies were responsible for protecting the lives and property of the people. He appealed to the entire nation and political parties of Pakistan to give up their differences and stay united for the great cause of national security.