Islamabad, Jan.29 : Pakistan People's Party (PPP) Information Secretary Sherry Rehman has said that the PPP is positive about winning US support to its demand for a UN probe into former prime minister Benazir Bhutto's assassination.
Pakistan People's Party (PPP) Information Secretary Sherry Rehman has said that the PPP is positive about winning US support to its demand for a UN probe into former prime minister Benazir Bhutto's assassination.
Talking to the Daily Times here on her return from a visit to the United States, where she led a three-member PPP delegation that met US senators, members of Congress and key officials of the US State Department and National Security Council in Washington DC to muster support for her party's demand for a UN-led investigation into Benazir's murder, she said: "We have seen a lot of support in the US Senate and the Congress on a probe into Benazir's assassination and timely elections. These are our core demands."
She said that the other members of the delegation were Palwasha Behram and Senator Javed Leghari.
"We also apprised the US officials of our demands for reconstitution of the Election Commission, free movement of elections observers and free media and judiciary," she added.
Pressed to reveal details of their meetings with the members of National Security Council and US State Department, she only said they got "a patient hearing".
She said that the delegation met Senator Christopher Dodd from the Foreign Relations Committee, Congressman John Tierney (chairman of National Security Subcommittee of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee and Select Committee on Intelligence), Congressman Steven Lynch (member of National Security Subcommittee of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee), Brooke Bennett (staffer for Congressman Tom Davis and Homeland Security and Ranking member of Oversight and Government Reform Committee), David Turk (staffer for Congressman Henry Waxman, chairman of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee), Congressman Mike Pence (Foreign Affairs and Ranking member of the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Middle East and South Asia), Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee (Co-Chair Pakistan Caucus, House Foreign Relations Committee), Congresswoman Jane Harman (Homeland Security), Congressman Joe Wilson (Armed Services and Foreign Affairs), Congressman James Moran (Appropriations) and Senator Joe Lieberman.
The team also met members of the US president's top administration including Mark Webber (assistant to the President and Senior Director for National Security Affairs for South and Central Asia at the National Security Council), Ambassador Boucher (Bureau of South and Central Asian Affairs of State Department), Richard Sacks (acting director for Pakistan and Bangladesh), Tom West (Pakistan Desk officer) and key staffers of Senators Feingold, Hillary Clinton and Barak Obama.
It also held meetings with US think tanks and held public talks at Brookings Institution and Woodrow Wilson Centre and Claudia Delmas Scherrer at the Embassy of France. (ANI)
© 2007 ANI
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