Pakistan halts Indus canals project after India moves to suspend treaty

Pakistan government has decided to halt the contentious canals project after India decided to suspend the Indus Waters Treaty in the wake of deadly terrorist attack in Pahalgam.

Army chief General Asim Munir and Punjab Chief Minister Maryam Nawaz had inaugurated the ambitious Cholistan project in February to irrigate the desert region in Punjab province.

However, it created an uproar in Sindh province where different political parties, including the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), which is part of the ruling coalition at the centre with Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), began protest against the project.

At the height of the tension between the two parties, India announced to suspend the Indus Waters Treaty (IWT), prompting Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif to meet PPP chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari and agreed to stop the canals project.

They also agreed that the contentious canals project will remain suspended until a consensus on the issue could be reached in the Council of Common Interests (CCI), a high powered inter-provincial body to tackle controversies between provinces.

Dawn reported that addressing a press conference with Bilawal, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said the two sides considered the country's situation in detail and India's announcements related to the rivers.

Today, we decided in the meeting between the PPP and PML-N with mutual agreement that until a decision is reached with mutual consensus in the CCI, no further canal will be constructed and the federal government has decided that there will be no further progress on canals without the consensus of opinion among provinces, he said.

The CCI meeting was being called on May 2, in which the PPP and PML-N's decisions would be backed.

Bilawal thanked the prime minister for hearing out the PPP and the nation's reservations and complaints in the detailed engagement and taking important subsequent decisions.

He said the prime minister had largely addressed the complaints of those protesting the government's policy and expressed hope that the CCI meeting would endorse the decision of no new canal construction without mutual agreement.

We are not taking any decision today, but only affirming that without a consensus, new canals will not be made. I am looking forward to the CCI meeting.

Bilawal also strongly condemned India's announcements, particularly regarding the IWT, and said they were not only illegal but against humanity.

We will stand together with you and raise Pakistan's case not only on the streets but on the international level and will give a befitting response to India's decision, the former foreign minister said.

Earlier, the announcement by the federal government said that there is a proposal to construct six canals in the Punjab province to irrigate land in the Cholistan region under the Green Pakistan Initiative a project that has the support of the powerful army, the government and the provincial administration.

The government announcement came in January and the soft launch in Cholistan took place in February.

Meanwhile, Pakistan reiterated on Friday that the Indus water treaty is of critical importance for Pakistan's water security and economy and it will take all appropriate steps to preserve its sanctity and smooth implementation.

Tension escalated between India and Pakistan after terrorists opened fire in Jammu and Kashmir's Pahalgam on Tuesday, killing 26 people, mostly tourists, in the deadliest attack in the Valley since the Pulwama strike in 2019. The Resistance Front (TRF), a proxy of the banned Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), claimed responsibility for the attack.