The government has sought a three-year extension in the term of military courts. The government has formulated a draft to carry out legal amendments that aim to extend the tenure of military courts — they had ceased to function after expiry of tenure earlier this year.
A meeting of parliamentary leaders was convened by the government in which it distributed the copy of draft among the attendees. According to the new definition of ‘terrorist’, revealed in the new draft, now anyone can be termed a terrorist regardless of the matter that whether he is motivated by religion or not.
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Commenting on the matter, Pakistan People’s Party Leader Naveed Qamar said they have not supported the extension of military courts yet.
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Addressing a press briefing following the meeting, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) leader Shah Mehmood Qureshi asked, “What surety is there that situation will get better if military courts are granted extension?” He said that the meeting was briefed on the implementation of National Action Plan (NAP) by National Security Adviser Nasir Janjua.
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“The security adviser also informed about the necessity of amending laws to try more terrorists,” Qureshi added.
The PTI leader said that the government wants to pass the bill immediately but “doing anything in haste will not do any good”.
The meeting of parliamentary leaders is yet to decide whether an all parties conference will be called under the chairmanship of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to settle this matter.
“Ishaq Dar believes that if a consensus is reached in the meeting of parliamentary leaders, then there will be no need of calling any APC with the premier in chair,” said Qureshi.
