Islamabad - Senate Chairman Mian Raza Rabbani Monday grilled Defence Minister Khurram Dastgir Khan for not taking the House into confidence over sending of 1,000 Pakistani troops to Saudi Arabia on a ‘training and advisory mission’.

An altercation between the Senate chairman and the defence minister occurred when latter was giving a policy statement in the House about sending more Pakistan troops to Saudi Arabia, saying currently around 1,600 Pakistani troops were on deputation in the Kingdom.

The defence minister said the prime minister has approved deputing additional Pakistani troops to Saudi Arabia for training and advisory purposes.

The Senate chairman censured Dastagir for not taking the House into confidence despite the fact that both the defence minister and the premier had the knowledge of a decision for several months.

When the Senate chairman asked if the details can be revealed during an in-camera session,” the defence minister said. “Even in an in-camera session, we would request not to be asked questions on the exact deployment as this is an issue relating to the national security and that of the troops.”

The defence minister attempted to assure the Senate that the troops will not be deployed outside the Kingdom’s territory, but Chairman Rabbani expressed a lack of confidence in the assurance, saying this information was already known.

“The House is not satisfied with your response,” he told Dastagir, while Senator Farhatullah Babar stressed that “all concerns remain there despite the defence minister’s statement”.

“Has a decision been taken to deploy troops at the border of the southern Saudi province of Sharura?” he asked.

The Senate chairman told the defence minister that he could not hide any information from parliament, and even offered him the option of briefing the Senate on the issue in detail in an in-camera session. “Don’t give us a lollipop... we are not children,” Rabbani told the defence minister.

However, the defence minister turned down the offer, stressing that he could not divulge operational details of the mission. “Don’t ask where the troops will be deployed in Saudi Arabia,” he further said.

The defence minister went on to say that Pakistani troops being dispatched to Saudi Arabia were only meant for imparting training to Saudi security personnel instead of entangling in the Yemen war. He said the assistance being rendered to Saudi Arabia was a continuation of the on-going support and within the confines of the joint parliamentary resolution of April 2015.

Dastgir said the planned training and advisory contingent has not yet been dispatched to Saudi Arabia. He said the contingent will have the strength of over 1,000 troops of all ranks and will be dispatched shortly. The minister said the contingent deputed in Saudi Arabia will perform its training and advisory mission while remaining within the geographical boundaries of the Kingdom.

He said the training of Saudi forces was governed by the 1982 bilateral protocol regarding the deputation of Pakistan’s Armed Forces’ personnel. He said that Pakistan and Saudi Arabia also hold joint defence exercises regularly.

Earlier, the House unanimously passed a bill seeking to decriminalise suicide attempt and providing treatment and protection to those who try to end their lives.

Under Section 325 of the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC), both suicide and attempted suicide are currently considered criminal offences, with the latter punishable either by a jail term of up to a year, or a fine, or both.

The Criminal Laws (Amendment) Bill 2017, moved by Senator Karim Khawaja and already cleared by the Senate Standing Committee on Interior, proposes that the survivors of suicide attempts should be provided treatment and not awarded punishment as they try to commit suicide because of chemical changes in their brain which was nothing but a disease.

“The state should treat those who seek to take their own lives like a mother,” the bill argues. “A person attempts suicide only in a state of extreme frustration,” it says, demanding that the state safeguard the victims of mental illnesses and depression.

In October last year, the Senate had deferred the same bill with Rabbani ruling that a decision was not possible without a definitive view of the Council of Islamic Ideology.

Senate Standing Committee on Interior Chairman Rehman Malik had then informed the House that according to the CII, there were no clear directions in the religion about the fate of survivors of suicide attempts. The criminalization of suicidal behaviour is one of the main reasons that the people do not seek help for the psychological problem that may have precipitated the act.

The Senate also passed three resolutions. In the first resolution, the House recommended to the government that the process of delimitations of constituencies in Fata for the next general election be stopped and 2018 elections should be held there as per previous delimitations.

In the second resolution, the House recommended in view of the growing collaboration between Pakistan and China under the CPEC, courses of the official Chinese language should be launched for all current and prospective Pakistani CPEC human resources in order to overcome any costly communication barrier.

The third resolution recommended the government to take necessary steps to set up separate branches of the National Bank of Pakistan in Tehsils Dadak and Kangri of district Musakhel, Balochistan. Earlier, the Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Bill, 2017 was laid before the House. The bill provides protection, relief and rehabilitation of rights of the transgender persons and their welfare.

 

 

Sparks in Senate as govt refuses details on troops to KSA