Commonwealth conference concludes: speakers for coordinated strategy to meet regional challenges

Participants of the 4th Commonwealth Parliamentary Association (CPA) Conference, which held in the city on Wednesday, emphasised on evolving co-ordinated strategy to meet regional challenges. Legislators of the commonwealth nations of the south region concluded the conference with a note of urgency to remove trade barriers, terrorism and harassment against women at workplaces amongst the member states.
On the final day of the gathering of global lawmakers, the speakers highlighted two topics including terrorism and women harassment. Few of them also censured the international community for not recognising Pakistan's huge sacrifices, which its nation had offered in the ongoing war on terror.
A member of Pakistan National Assembly, Mir Munawwar Talpur, said his nation had rendered huge economic and human sacrifices in the ongoing war on terror, which was in every term bigger than that of any other country of the world. He enumerated Pakistan had lost over 35,000 human lives to the flames of war against the terrorism and as his nation had suffered around 3,486 bomb blasts since 2001, leaving over a $68 billion of infrastructure ravaged in their fatal wake.
Senator Haji Adeel said Pakistan had paid a big price just in trying to assist the global community in their war against terrorism with a view to uproot the menace from the region. He said despite Pakistan's all-out efforts, the western powers were lashing his nation for their forces' failure in Afghanistan to take over the soil against the militants there.
He observed the global community and the media had singled out Pakistan for criticism in the continued war against terror, thrusting aside his nation's efforts and sacrifices. He said let alone others, the Pakistan's key western allies in the war against terrorism continued to cast doubts on his country's sincere efforts toward the elimination of terror.
He urged the European and US to avoid discounting his nation's greater sacrifices for their war and stop irrational demands from Pakistan. The Senator was skeptic about the sincerity of the international community's efforts. Speaker Sindh Assembly, Nisar Khuhro expressed the hope the Commonwealth would agree to scale down the trade barriers amongst the countries of commonwealth or may be the SAARC would take it up and reduce those restrictions.
Speaker Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Assembly, Karamatullah Khan said terrorism had left its negative impact on entire region, He said a collective responsibility of the regional and international players could only help the nations fight against the menace. Speaker of Balochistan Assembly, Mohammad Aslam Bhootani said the term terrorism was lacking a universally agreed definition, as there was no clarity on the issue. He urged the international community to consider terrorism as an equivocally disputed issue in principles globally.
Those attended the conference included Chamal Raja Paksa, Speaker Sri Lanka, Dr Sandeep Khanna, Representative of CPA National Branch of Indian Lok Sabha, Mohammad Aslam Bhootani, Speaker Balochistan Assembly, Rana Mohammad Iqbal Khan Speaker Punjab Assembly, Karamatullah Khan Speaker Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly, MNA Nafisa Shah and a host of senators, MNAs and MPAs from across Pakistan.