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Pakistan’s interim Prime Minister Anwaar-ul-Haq Kakar has included Mishaal Hussain Malik, the wife of imprisoned separatist leader Yasin Malik, in his cabinet. She has been designated as Pakistan’s Minister for Human Rights, according to a report published by Reuters.
Yasin Malik, the chief of the Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF), had been found guilty by a National Investigation Agency (NIA) court in terror funding cases and was sentenced to life imprisonment on May 25, 2022.
Mishaal Hussain Malik’s India connection
Mishaal Hussain Malik, a Pakistani national, is married to Yasin Malik who is the chief of the Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) in India. The two met in 2005 when Yasin had gone to Islamabad to gather support for the Kashmiri separatist movement. Malik got impressed by Yasin’s speech and heaped compliments on him. The couple fell in love and got married in 2009.
Malik visited India twice in 2014. Since then, the wife of Kashmiri separatist Yasin Malik has not shown any interest in visiting India nor has she applied for a visa since her two-year visa expired in 2015, a home ministry official had earlier said.
Mushaal Hussein Malik has been quoted in media reports as saying that India had not allowed her to meet Malik and his family for about three years and New Delhi should show a “humanitarian gesture”, PTI had earlier reported.
A look at Pakistan’s caretaker government
In addition, former central bank chief Shamshad Akhtar has been chosen as the Finance Minister of the interim cabinet, and former provincial minister Sarfaraz Bugti has been named the Interior Minister.
Also read: Pakistan caretaker PM Anwaarul Haq Kakar’s 18-member Cabinet takes oath
On August 17, Pakistan’s President Arif Alvi administered the oath to the newly appointed members of interim PM Anwaar-ul-Haq Kakar’s cabinet. A total of sixteen federal ministers took their oaths, and the interim PM also appointed three advisers, as detailed in a list of cabinet members released by the Presidency as reported by Dawn.
Among the other federal ministers taking office are Jalil Abbas Jilani, Lt General (retired) Anwar Ali Hyder, Murtaza Solangi Sami Saeed, Shahid Ashraf Tarar, Ahmad Irfan Aslam, Muhammad Ali, Gohar Ejaz, Umar Saif, Nadeem Jan, Khalil George, Aneeq Ahmad, Jamal Shah, and Madad Ali Sindhi.
The advisors to Pakistan’s caretaker PM include Air Marshal (retired) Farhat Hussain Khan, Ahad Khan Cheema, and Waqar Masood Khan, the report stated.
Anwaar-ul-Haq Kakar, a Senator and leader of the Balochistan Awami Party (BAP), assumed the role of Pakistan’s interim PM on August 14. The oath-taking ceremony was conducted in the presence of outgoing Pakistan PM Shehbaz Sharif and his former cabinet ministers.
The Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) had been banned in 2019. Furthermore, on July 15 of this year, Rubaiya Sayeed, the sister of Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) president Mehbooba Mufti and daughter of former Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed, identified Yasin Malik in connection with her kidnapping on December 8, 1989.
(With inputs from agencies)
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Updated: 18 Aug 2023, 08:37 AM IST
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