Three-tier scrutiny of seminaries with terror links launched
ISLAMABAD
- As part of implementation on the National Action Plan (NAP) on
Counterterrorism recently announced by the prime minister, the Ministry
of Interior has started a three-tier scrutiny of some madrassas as
identified by the intelligence agencies for their alleged links with
terrorist and banned organisations to start strict action against these.
The Ministry of Interior has described this in ‘NAP Implementation Progress Report’ that was shared with Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan at a meeting held on Friday. The meeting was held to review the progress and implementation of the NAP at which the interior secretary, officials of National Coordination (NC), National Counterterrorism Authority (Nacta) and others were present.
The report says the intelligence agencies had identified a few madrassahs having links with terrorist organisations on which a three-tier scrutiny is under progress by the provinces and the federal government for future course of action. However, the report did not name such madrassas while an officer of the Ministry of Interior said the issue was highly sensitive and controversial, so the names have been kept ‘most secret’.
According to the report, the Ministry of Interior, after thorough deliberations with mobile phone operators, has succeeded in reaching an agreement with them to re-verify 100 million mobile cells SIMs in the country within 90 days through biometric system.
After the December 16 terrorist attack on Army Public School in Peshawar, the Ministry of Interior had given the deadline of 28 days to mobile phone operators for the re-verification of all SIMs that had not been verified through biometric system. The direction came after the initial reports of the Peshawar incident revealed that the terrorists were in contact through mobile phones with their handlers.
The cellular phone companies at first had refused to accept the deadline of 28 days, saying the time was too short to complete the task. Hearing the reservations of the mobile companies, the Ministry of Interior held a number of meetings with the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA and five mobile operators of the country to resolve the matter that has been haunting the country for the last six years.
The mobile phone operators, following the directions of the government, started the pilot project of biometric verification system of SIMs on December 1, 2013, in Balochistan and Karachi at the time of their issuance to the customer. Later, the project was started throughout the country from August 1, 2014. Prior to this there was no proper verification system of SIMs at the time of issuance to the customers. The interior minister, during the meeting, warned that no leniency would be shown towards the companies owning un-verified/illegal SIMs after the expiry of 90 days.
Te report of implementation on NAP says that daily combing/search operations are underway throughout the country and 2,000 persons have been arrested.
According to the report, registration of Afghan refugees has been started in all the provinces and the Punjab alone has registered 7,000 Afghan refugees who had not previously been registered through biometric verification. A similar exercise is awaited from other provinces. At the next stage, these refugees will be shifted back to their camps for their honourable repatriation to Afghanistan by involving UNHCR, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and after due deliberations with the Afghan government.
NAP Implementation Progress Report reveals that Nacta Helpline 1717 has received 358 actionable calls during the last nine days that were promptly conveyed to relevant forums but most of these calls were found inaccurate. It says that it is a matter of concern that 500/600 hoax calls are being received daily through the helpline that are proving to be burden on the system and preventing due focus of the officials on genuine terrorism threats/information.
The meeting was informed that, concurrently, identification of the TTP affiliates and sleepers is also underway and the Punjab alone has so far identified 95 persons who were suspected to have links with terrorist organisations and efforts are on to arrest them. More information and homework needs to be carried out by the other provinces over the next few days to achieve maximum results, the committee was told.
The report says that 72 organisations have been declared as proscribed by the MoI and a comprehensive analysis/assessment review is underway to identify how many of the proscribed organisations are active, working under other names and/or more importantly how many of them have an armed wing, operating inside or outside the country.
The chair was informed that misuse of loudspeakers was being checked through monitoring committees at provincial level while a crackdown had been started to curb hate literature and destroy it. In the Federal Capital Territory alone, 176 cases were registered over violation of Loudspeaker Act and 115 persons arrested. All the provinces have been asked to take proactive action in this regard.
According to the report, the provinces have been asked to devise a multi-faceted scrutiny process regarding the cases to be forwarded to the military courts that will further be fine-tuned by the Ministry of Interior at the federal level before forwarding these cases to the Ministry of Defence. It is also clarified that a lot of figures and a number of such cases that are being quoted in the press are speculations. At the moment, the Ministry of Interior is engaged with the provincial governments and military authorities to evolve a system as mandated by the 21st Constitutional Amendment. However, the number and scope of cases to be referred to the military courts and the level and stages of scrutiny in this regard are still being worked out. It will take a few days before these details are made public.
NAP Implementation and Progress Report also says that an integrated Directorate of Internal Security supported and complemented by Joint Intelligence Directorate is being established, which will house representatives of all the intelligence agencies in the country, in coordination with the Ministry o Interior and it will act as a central data centre to receive, disseminate and take follow-up action on actionable intelligence received from all over the country.
It was also decided at the meeting that the interior minister would hold review meetings daily on the implementation from next week and the progress made on this front will also be made public. The minister was apprised that the ministry and Nacta were rigorously pursuing the implementation of NAP in coordination with the provincial governments and military authorities.
The Ministry of Interior has described this in ‘NAP Implementation Progress Report’ that was shared with Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan at a meeting held on Friday. The meeting was held to review the progress and implementation of the NAP at which the interior secretary, officials of National Coordination (NC), National Counterterrorism Authority (Nacta) and others were present.
The report says the intelligence agencies had identified a few madrassahs having links with terrorist organisations on which a three-tier scrutiny is under progress by the provinces and the federal government for future course of action. However, the report did not name such madrassas while an officer of the Ministry of Interior said the issue was highly sensitive and controversial, so the names have been kept ‘most secret’.
According to the report, the Ministry of Interior, after thorough deliberations with mobile phone operators, has succeeded in reaching an agreement with them to re-verify 100 million mobile cells SIMs in the country within 90 days through biometric system.
After the December 16 terrorist attack on Army Public School in Peshawar, the Ministry of Interior had given the deadline of 28 days to mobile phone operators for the re-verification of all SIMs that had not been verified through biometric system. The direction came after the initial reports of the Peshawar incident revealed that the terrorists were in contact through mobile phones with their handlers.
The cellular phone companies at first had refused to accept the deadline of 28 days, saying the time was too short to complete the task. Hearing the reservations of the mobile companies, the Ministry of Interior held a number of meetings with the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA and five mobile operators of the country to resolve the matter that has been haunting the country for the last six years.
The mobile phone operators, following the directions of the government, started the pilot project of biometric verification system of SIMs on December 1, 2013, in Balochistan and Karachi at the time of their issuance to the customer. Later, the project was started throughout the country from August 1, 2014. Prior to this there was no proper verification system of SIMs at the time of issuance to the customers. The interior minister, during the meeting, warned that no leniency would be shown towards the companies owning un-verified/illegal SIMs after the expiry of 90 days.
Te report of implementation on NAP says that daily combing/search operations are underway throughout the country and 2,000 persons have been arrested.
According to the report, registration of Afghan refugees has been started in all the provinces and the Punjab alone has registered 7,000 Afghan refugees who had not previously been registered through biometric verification. A similar exercise is awaited from other provinces. At the next stage, these refugees will be shifted back to their camps for their honourable repatriation to Afghanistan by involving UNHCR, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and after due deliberations with the Afghan government.
NAP Implementation Progress Report reveals that Nacta Helpline 1717 has received 358 actionable calls during the last nine days that were promptly conveyed to relevant forums but most of these calls were found inaccurate. It says that it is a matter of concern that 500/600 hoax calls are being received daily through the helpline that are proving to be burden on the system and preventing due focus of the officials on genuine terrorism threats/information.
The meeting was informed that, concurrently, identification of the TTP affiliates and sleepers is also underway and the Punjab alone has so far identified 95 persons who were suspected to have links with terrorist organisations and efforts are on to arrest them. More information and homework needs to be carried out by the other provinces over the next few days to achieve maximum results, the committee was told.
The report says that 72 organisations have been declared as proscribed by the MoI and a comprehensive analysis/assessment review is underway to identify how many of the proscribed organisations are active, working under other names and/or more importantly how many of them have an armed wing, operating inside or outside the country.
The chair was informed that misuse of loudspeakers was being checked through monitoring committees at provincial level while a crackdown had been started to curb hate literature and destroy it. In the Federal Capital Territory alone, 176 cases were registered over violation of Loudspeaker Act and 115 persons arrested. All the provinces have been asked to take proactive action in this regard.
According to the report, the provinces have been asked to devise a multi-faceted scrutiny process regarding the cases to be forwarded to the military courts that will further be fine-tuned by the Ministry of Interior at the federal level before forwarding these cases to the Ministry of Defence. It is also clarified that a lot of figures and a number of such cases that are being quoted in the press are speculations. At the moment, the Ministry of Interior is engaged with the provincial governments and military authorities to evolve a system as mandated by the 21st Constitutional Amendment. However, the number and scope of cases to be referred to the military courts and the level and stages of scrutiny in this regard are still being worked out. It will take a few days before these details are made public.
NAP Implementation and Progress Report also says that an integrated Directorate of Internal Security supported and complemented by Joint Intelligence Directorate is being established, which will house representatives of all the intelligence agencies in the country, in coordination with the Ministry o Interior and it will act as a central data centre to receive, disseminate and take follow-up action on actionable intelligence received from all over the country.
It was also decided at the meeting that the interior minister would hold review meetings daily on the implementation from next week and the progress made on this front will also be made public. The minister was apprised that the ministry and Nacta were rigorously pursuing the implementation of NAP in coordination with the provincial governments and military authorities.
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