ISLAMABAD: A meeting of the special ministerial committee to discuss the extradition treaty between Pakistan and the United Kingdom (UK) was held here with Interior Minister Sheikh Rasheed in the chair.
Foreign Minister, Shah Mahmood Qureshi, Federal Minister for Human Rights Shireen Mazari also attended the meeting, while Interior Secretary Yousuf Naseem Khokhar attended the meeting via video link.
The ministers after reviewing the recommendations of the extradition treaty gave final approval and decided to share the same with the UK government.
After the consultation with the UK government, the draft will be presented before the federal cabinet for the go-ahead.
If Pakistan succeeds in signing this accord, it will join the club of over 100 countries that have such an agreement with the United Kingdom and both the countries can exchange convicted prisoners.
However, the agreement will only allow the repatriation of those citizens who have been sentenced by the courts of law.
The first round of the discussion about the extradition treaty was held in October 2019.
Currently, no formal extradition treaty exists between Pakistan and the UK through Section 194 of the UK Extradition Act 2003 contains provisions for special ad hocextradition arrangements.
In March 2020, the Foreign Ministry had written a letter to the United Kingdom seeking former prime minister Nawazs deportation as he was not admitted to any hospital despite staying in London for 105 days.
TTP’s demands not acceptable to Pakistan: Sheikh Rashid
Meanwhile, Interior Minister Sheikh Rashid said on Saturday that the Afghan Taliban have guaranteed that no militant group would be allowed to operate against Pakistan.
While addressing a press conference in Islamabad, the minister said that the banned Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) had made some demands during the talks that were unacceptable.
“If they accept Pakistan’s constitution and laws, our doors are still open,” he said while referring to the possibility of resumption of talks with the TTP.
Pakistan’s government announced late last year it had entered a month-long truce with the TTP, facilitated by Afghanistan’s Taliban, but that expired on December 9 after peace talks failed to make progress.
The minister added that Pakistan has not held talks with Daish or the Baloch Nationalist Army (BNA), the group which claimed responsibility for the Lahore bomb blast on Thursday.
“BNA is a small group,” he said, adding that culprits of the Lahore blast will be apprehended soon.
He noted that militant attacks in Pakistan have grown in the last three months. “These attacks cannot break our resolve to tackle militancy.”
Earlier this week, Rashid had said that there was a need to stay alert of terrorism-related incidents. “We have received a kind of signal that terrorist incidents have started happening in Islamabad. This is the first incident of the year and we need to be very alert,” he said.
Talking about Afghanistan, the minister said the current atmosphere in the country is not against Pakistan. “Taliban have defeated some 42 international forces that were fighting against them in Afghanistan.”
He asked the opposition parties to delay their March 23 rally in Islamabad as many leaders of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) were coming to Pakistan to participate in the Pakistan Day Parade.
Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi said earlier this month that a meeting of the OIC will be held on March 22 in Islamabad.
“We will celebrate our 75th Pakistan Day with our brothers and the OIC Foreign Ministers Council will attend the March 23 parade as a guest,” said Qureshi.