LAHORE - An OIC conference is going to be held in Pakistan in which the Kashmiris will present their own case, Railways Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed said here on Saturday. Talking to reporters at the railways headquarters, he vehemently praised Prime Minister Imran Khan for his address to the UN General Assembly and said now all opposition parties would stand behind him. “This is decided”.

JUI-F chief Maulana Fazlur Rehman plans to go for a march on Islamabad in the last week of October to mount pressure on the government to quit. He is trying to persuade important opposition parties like the PML-N and the PPP to join hands with him. Sheikh Rashid said the parties the Maulana was trying to take along wanted him to delay the plan.

The minister said Pakistan had importance both for the US and China and ties with them would remain unaffected in the days to come. In his opinion, since the prime minister had properly highlighted the status of Holy Prophet (PBUH) for Muslims in his hour-long speech, the JUI-F chief should review his long march and lockdown plan.

Rubbishes reports that IMF wanted Pakistan to shelve CPEC

According to him, the US wanted Pakistan’s support for peace in Afghanistan while every single child of Pakistan was proud of relations with China.

He indicated that the prime minister would be visiting China next month to discuss host of subjects. He said since US was a super power it needed to maintain ties with India as well.

Answering a question, the minister rubbished reports that the IMF wanted Pakistan to shelve the CPEC. “It has to be completed,” he said emphatically. The Chinese involved in this project would be returning to Pakistan in 8 to 10 days and the government has got vacated rest houses for them, he said.

About performance of the railways, he claimed that it was improving with passage of time. As many as 8 million new passengers have joined the railways load.  Likewise the demand for freight trains was going up. At present, he said, 138 trains were operating daily and with the availability of more coaches their number would be raised to 150.

He made it clear that he was trying his best to bring the railways losses down to zero.