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Today's Paper | November 23, 2024

Updated 08 Nov, 2018 12:33pm

MNAs Mohsin Dawar, Ali Wazir call on Prime Minister Imran Khan

Members of National Assembly (MNA) Mohsin Dawar and Ali Wazir called on Prime Minister Imran Khan on Wednesday.

Their meeting with the premier was announced on Twitter by the Pashtun Tahaffuz Movement (PTM), to which the two independent lawmakers belong.

Minister for Human Rights Dr Shireen Mazari termed the meeting a "great development".

"PM has always spoken [about] the genuine grievances of the people of what was FATA - incl[uding] on the floor of the NA," the minister said.

"Now the 2 PTM MNAs will be involved in the dev/merger policies relating to their area," she said, referring to Dawar and Wazir, who hail from North and South Waziristan, respectively.

What is PTM?

PTM — a movement for the rights of those affected by the war against militancy in the tribal areas, especially South Waziristan — has been protesting in different parts of the country against enforced disappearances, extrajudicial arrests and killings, as well as the mistreatment of the Pakhtun community.

PTM first made headlines in Islamabad following the extrajudicial killing of Waziristan native Naqeebullah Mehsud — a shopkeeper and aspiring model — by police in Karachi in January.

The movement's leaders claim that in the past decade, 32,000 Pashtuns have gone missing from Fata. They insist that their struggle is to ensure implementation of the Constitution, under which law-enforcement agencies are supposed to provide details of the people they pick up and present them before courts within a stipulated time period.

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