Pakistan Times!

KUALA LUMPUR: The Malaysian Press has termed Pakistan as a safe place to make investment and to do business as the security situation in Pakistan is getting better day by day. The eight member delegation of Malaysian journalists who visited Pakistan last week contributing various stories to there respective news papers on security situation in Pakistan and termed it much better in reality than the perception prevailing in Malaysia due to exaggerated reporting of the Western media.

In a five column article, published in the second largest English daily of Malaysia, “ “New Straits Times”, titled, “It really isn’t all gloom ‘n doom”, while quoting a top Pakistani military spokesman Brig. Muhammad Tariq Jilani said that the scale of suicide bombing in major cities in Pakistan has significantly dropped in the year 2008 compared to the last year.

The newspapers reported that the decreased in suicide bombing is attributed to the Army’s successes in clearing out militants from their enclaves in the tribal belt which boarder Afghanistan.The Articles further said that the Tribes have woken up to the fact that it is not in their interest to shelter the militants and with their help the militants are being pushed against a wall.

The articles while quoting Brig. Tarqi Gilani said that the Army had gone into the Waziristan which two years ago was a support base for the militants and have driven them out.

The report added that now it is quieter there and the Army is continuing its operation in other tribal areas.

While quoting Privatization and Investment Minister, Waqar Ahmad Khan the report adds that no investors have had her ventures destroyed by violence. The situation in Pakistan is grossly exaggerated by the western media which is against the reality. To set the point home the article said “it would be helpful to apply the perception versus reality, test to the rash of knife crime in Britain”

Elaborating the point the article while quoting Guardian Online news blog posting said that statistics from the British Crime Survey showed that there were up to 130,000 violent knife-crime incidents from 2007 to 2008.The same report also said that almost 14,000 people were treated in hospitals for stab wounds last year, an increase of 20 per cent in five years.

The reports added that “And yet this scourge has not deterred thousands of Malaysians from going to study, work and play in Britain’’ whereas the situation is Pakistan is much better in reality than its perceptions.-SANA