Karachi, October 24: Ethnic Conflict in Sindh needs to be resolved through dialogue, developing tolerance among cross section of society, decreasing economic disparity, controlling law and order situation and most importantly through bridging communication gap between major stakeholders of the Sindh, agreed Legislators from the Provincial Assembly of Sindh and representatives of major political parties in Sindh at a Conflict Resolution simulation exercise on �How to Resolve Real Conflicts� organized by PILDAT.

Participants, who took part in various exercises of negotiation strategies and conflict resolution as part of a structured workshop, believed they, along with the Executive, should play an important role in facilitating the discourse among all stakeholders of Sindh to manage the conflict. Participants urged the administrative authorities to be neutral and non-partisan to control ethnic conflict in Sindh.

To assist the members of the Provincial Assembly of Sindh, representatives and youth wings of major political parties and in enhancing the conflict resolution and negotiation strategies, a simulation exercise organized by PILDAT was conducted by a seasoned instructor, Mohammed Feyyaz, who has extensive experience of leading similar workshops in renowned national institutions, based on a live issue of Ethnic Conflict in Sindh.

The workshop was attended by senior and seasoned legislators from the Provincial Assembly of Sindh and office bearers and representatives of major political parties including Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), Pakistan Muslim League-N (PML-N), Awami National Party (ANP) and Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaf (PTI).

A Background Paper on �Ethnic Conflict in Sindh� to assist the participants was also prepared for the workshop and disseminated as part of workshop papers.

Groups were briefed on how to understand the contours of a conflict and prepare negotiation points in each group. Actively assisted by the Conductor on the strategies of negotiations, they faced each other on the negotiation table. Skillfully managed, the talks achieved meaningful result and the members agreed in a media debrief that tolerance, peace, good governance, economic harmony and most importantly political will of the major political parties is the way forward to manage the historical ethnic conflict in Sindh.

The workshop is the 3rd and last of the series of exercises organised by PILDAT on How to Resolve Real Conflicts to enhance conflict understanding, resolution and negotiation strategies among elected legislators and office bearers of major political parties through which participants will be trained through an opportunity to resolve a real issue, in a real time setting, through simulated role playing so as to generate meaningful solutions to the issue.