NA committee seeks compensation from NATO for badly damaging Pak roads

Islamabad, Nov 28 (ANI): Pakistan's National Assembly Committee on States and Frontier Regions (SAFRON) has expressed serious concern over the free movement of NATO convoys that have badly damaged the roads in FATA.

The committee has decided to discuss the issue with the finance and commerce ministries, so that some portion of the revenue collected from the trucks might be utilised for maintenance of the roads used by them.

According to the Daily Times, Pakistan government might charge NATO for using its national highways, and that the revenue generated would directly go into the account of the Finance Ministry.

Federal Minister for SAFRON, Najmuddin Khan, informed the committee that the finance and commerce ministries may be asked to separate the shares of FATA from the NATO receipts in regard of using the region's roads, and the money would be utilised for the repair and maintenance of roads damaged because of the heavy trucks.

Just a few days back, Minister for Communications Arbab Alamgir had said NATO supply convoys had caused around 82 billion dollars worth of damage to the infrastructure of Pakistan's communication network, as about 500 trucks with supplies for NATO forces travelled from Karachi to Afghanistan on a daily basis.

"We will again take up the issue with NATO as our 80 percent traffic flows through these highways, which are in a very bad condition due to travel by heavy containers," Alamgir had added.

Earlier in October, according to diplomatic sources, the decision makers in Rawalpindi and Islamabad had decided to claim 600 million dollars from the forces as compensation for causing damage to Pakistan's extensive road network, maintaining that the country was suffering a huge loss of around 83 million dollars annually, due to the ISAF and NATO freight truckloads badly damaging the national highways network since 2002. (ANI)