At a conference in Tehran, Farooq H. Naek, the Chairman of the Pakistani Senate, said yesterday that Pakistan fully supports the Palestinian bid for an independent state with Al-Quds (Jerusalem) as its capital, according to a Pakistani daily.
Addressing the fifth International Conference on the Palestinian Intifada in Tehran, Naek said that the Palestinian Authority's progress in establishing state institutions is an auspicious augury for peace.
Highlighting Pakistan's stance on the issue, Naek said that Pakistan has a historical perspective deeply-rooted in the proactive role played by former Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto in highlighting the Palestinian issue in its true sense at the international fora.
According to a report in The News daily, the Senate chairman said that successive governments in Pakistan have continued their all-out support to the Palestinian cause, adding that President Asif Ali Zardari is diligently pursuing the cause with the same zeal and enthusiasm, making support to Palestinian brethren a corner stone of Pakistan's foreign policy.
He said that President Zardari's vision is also well reflected by Pakistani Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani's address at the UN General Assembly recently, reiterating Pakistan's principled stance of upholding the realization of the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people, including their right for a separate homeland.
"We can never accept the usurpation of additional Palestinian land. Israel has no right to erect its separation wall beyond its 1967 boundaries...I urge the leaders of the entire Muslim Ummah, as well the people, to join hands and build synergies in support for our Palestinian brethren and for their early deliverance from fear, atrocity and persecution," he told the Tehran conference.
Source: The News, Pakistan, October 3, 2011
