A second round of negotiations with the Joint Awami Action Committee (JAAC) in Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) is due to begin in Muzaffarabad on Friday, in a continued bid to end the ongoing unrest in the territory.
A high-level government delegation held negotiations with a civil society alliance in AJK on Thursday after days of fierce clashes between protesters and law enforcers left at least 10 people dead and scores critically injured.
The AJK prime minister and parliamentary affairs minister, Tariq Fazal Chaudhry, said that the second round of negotiations would begin in the AJK capital of Muzaffarabad today.
“Our negotiating delegation, which includes Raja Pervez Ashraf, Rana Sanaullah, Ahsan Iqbal, Sardar Yousaf, Qamar Zaman Kaira, Dr Tariq Fazal Chaudhry, Masood Ahmed and Amir Muqam, is present in Muzaffarabad,” he said, also posting the statement on social media.
He added that the representatives of the Action Committee had taken the time during the negotiations yesterday.
A three-day shutter-down strike paralysed AJK under a communications blackout, as JAAC pressed its demands after talks with the AJK government and federal ministers broke down last week over elite privileges and reserved seats for refugees. Subsequently, rival groups staged protests, trading blame for violence that marred what began as a largely peaceful movement.
Yesterday, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif had expressed deep concern over the unrest in AJK, directing the negotiation committee to immediately proceed to the AJK capital and find an immediate and lasting solution to the issues.
