Washington
Chief US diplomat for South Asian Affairs Alice Wells on Thursday hailed the conviction of Jamatud Dawa leader Hafiz Saeed and his aide Malik Zafar Iqbal as a “step forward” for Pakistan.
A day earlier, an anti-terrorism court convicted the two JuD leaders to five-and-a-half-years of rigorous imprisonment in two cases relating to terror financing.
The verdict came days ahead of the Financial Action Task Force’s meeting in Paris to decide Pakistan’s grey list fate.
Wells, in a tweet by the Bureau of South and Central Asian Affairs early Thursday, said that the conviction was a step forward, “both toward holding the banned Lashkar-e-Taiba accountable for its crimes and for Pakistan in meeting its international commitments to combat terrorist financing”.—Agencies