NA body approves National Counter Terrorism Authority Bill

ISLAMABAD: The National Assembly Standing Committee on Interior Thursday approved the National Counter Terrorism Authority (NACTA) Bill, 2013, unanimously, with certain changes.

The committee met here at the Ministry of Interior with Abdul Qadir Patel in the chair, said a press release.

Briefing the committee, the National Coordinator of the Authority said in order to root out terrorism and extremism from the country, there was a dire need to establish such an authority which would act and coordinate as a think tank among the state organizations.

He cited the examples of other countries like USA, UK, India, Saudi Arabia and Australia which reviewed their counter terrorism (CT) efforts and established organizations to coordinate intelligence and actions of law enforcement agencies and other stakeholders.

The main rationale of creating NACTA was nature and magnitude of threat, which necessitated setting up an organization dedicated to counter terrorism at national level, scientifically study the phenomenon of extremism, present strategic policy to the government and integrate intelligence on CT/CE, he added.

The NACTA will receive and collate data/ intelligence and disseminate to all the relevant stakeholders to formulate threat assessment with periodical reviews for making timely efforts to counter terrorism and extremism.

The authority shall have a Board of Governors comprising Prime Minister as its chairman, and Minister for Interior, provincial chief ministers, Chief Minister of G.B, Minister for Finance, Prime Minister of AJ&K, one Senator, one MNA, Secretary, Ministry of Interior, DGs ISI, IB, MI & FIA, National Coordinator and IGs of Provinces, AJ&K and G.B as its members. The Board shall be assisted by an executive committee.

The meeting was attended by members of the National Assembly Nazir Ahmed Bughio, Mrs. Tanzeela Aamir Cheema, Sheikh Waqqas Akram and Wasim Akhtar, and officers of the Ministry of Interior and NACTA.