Pakistan fought a long war against terrorism, says PM Imran Khan

ISLAMABAD (92 News) – Prime Minister Imran Khan has said that Pakistan fought a long war and sacrificed thousands of lives against terrorism. He was addressing a meeting of the Board of Governors of National Counter Terrorism Authority (NACTA) at Prime Minister’s Office on Tuesday. The prime minister stressed the need for effective links among intelligence agencies to deal with the challenges being faced by the country. Federal ministers, all the four chief ministers and DG ISI Naveed Mukhtar also participated in the meeting. The meeting decided to constitute a committee for reviewing the role and functioning of the organization. The committee would submit its recommendations to the prime minister in a week’s time. The meeting was attended by Defence Minister, Minister for Finance, Law Minister, Chief Ministers of the four provinces and Gilgit-Baltistan, Prime Minister AJK, MoS Interior, DG-ISI, Secretary Interior, National Coordinator NACTA, Chief Secretaries and IGs of Police and senior officials. The NACTA national coordinator briefed the meeting about the mandate and the role of the organization since its establishment as a premier body for policy formulation and implementation of national terrorism and counter violent extremism strategy. The meeting also reviewed, in detail, the progress on implementation status of 20-points National Action Plan. Lauding huge services and contributions of the armed forces, intelligence agencies, police and other law enforcement and security agencies, the prime minister observed that improved security situation today was a result of combined efforts of all stakeholders. Deploring the fact that not even a single meeting of the Board of Governors of the premier body could be convened since its inception, the prime minister pointed out that the neglect of the past government resulted in lack of focus on improving the functioning of an important organization. The prime minister said that that the new ground realities call for revisiting the role of the organization to make this body truly a proactive and sophisticated organization with a well-defined mandate.