I really hope Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and newly elected President Mamnoon Hussain will take up the issue of stranded Pakistanis in Bangladesh as their top priority. Sharif and late Ghulam Haider Wyne has done highly commendable job in donating land for construction of houses in Punjab under the Rabita Trust and most of these housing are vacant since only a few hundred were repatriated from Bangladesh in 1993. It is regrettable that former President Pervez Musharraf froze the trust during his rule, as a result of which all work related to repatriation and rehabilitation of stranded Pakistanis came to a halt and miseries of a quarter million people living is in squalid camps compounded. Meanwhile, the Bangladeshi government played a very negative role by stopping food supply from Red Cross. People living in these camps are suffering in absence of support either from Pakistan or from Bangladesh.
It is high time Nawaz Sharif reactivated the Rabita Trust and facilitated repatriation of stranded Pakistanis. At least a few thousands can be brought immediately and settled in vacant houses. — Syed Shahid Iqbal, Riyadh
Stranded Pakistanis
