Pakistan Tahreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan has on Tuesday announced to hold a peaceful demonstration outside the United Nations' headquarters in New York on October 26, to protest against the US drone attacks in Pakistan's tribal areas and in this connection he will present a petition to the UN.
While addressing a press conference, Imran Khan also announced to launch a world-wide signature campaign on social media against the drone attacks, so as to challenge the illegal nature of the strikes. He observed that the US drone attacks violated the UN Charter and hence the PTI would launch a global campaign against it.
Imran disclosed that PTI intended to file a petition against the attacks in the apex court and hold a demonstration with the innocent victims outside the Supreme Court of Pakistan so as to have their plight addressed. According to him, PTI's mission to Waziristan has achieved its objective. The peace rally was the first of its kind following military operation in October 2009 in South Waziristan against the banned militant outfit, Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP). Their mission has been successful; they have put the issue of drone attacks centre stage globally, with the international media focusing on it. Among the participants were many foreign civil society members and media people including around 30 US citizens.
He specifically thanked members of Code Pink and Clive Smith and appreciated their efforts immensely in spite of consistently being warned by the American ambassador himself, against accompanying the contingent. Imran stated that the party had taken a consistent position against the CIA's controversial drone war in Pakistan's tribal areas and the sheer volume of the convoy (25-km long) that was lead to South Waziristan indeed represents the sentiments of an overwhelming majority of Pakistanis who saw the relentless predator strikes on their soil as immoral, unethical and inhuman.
He claimed that instead of helping the participants of the peace march, the government tried to scare them away with rumours of suicide attacks. "First it was said that there will be six suicide attacks, and then the number was raised to nine. There were even rumours that the drinking water in Waziristan has been poisoned," he added.
He said the march had reiterated that Imran Khan and the top leadership of PTI along with the workers were brave, patriotic Pakistanis. He lauded the historic welcome given to them by the tribesmen at Tank and stated that it was the first time that there was hope for peace.
He said it was imperative to regain the confidence of the people of that region to bring about a change and that was the only way forward to win the war against this illegal US policy. He also specified that US presidential candidates had also condemned and commented on the excessive use of drones by US President Obama.
According to him, the government should have co-operated in making the peace march a success as it was a great opportunity for the country to raise the drone issue at international level but the government and other political parties lost the chance for sake of their personal interests. He criticised government for showing hypocrisy regarding the drone attacks and urged the rulers to speak truth to the people of Pakistan.
Replying to a question, he said there could only be two solutions, a military solution that had been used and had failed miserably, and a political solution that PTI had been stressing upon. "In eight years, the military solution has not achieved anything but the ruination of our armed forces; hence we need to revert to a political strategy on priority basis." Imran declared that with the current state of the economy and the fact that those in power were oblivious to the predicament of the nation the Tsunami might head towards Islamabad.