Jirga, militants to discuss deadline

MIRAMSHAH: The elders of the Uthmanzai Wazir tribe and a militants’ council plan to meet here on Saturday to discuss a 15-day deadline given by the government to local tribes for flushing out militants from the area. According to sources, a jirga led by Haji Sher Mohammad and the Mujahideen Shura led by Hafiz Gul Bahadur will meet at an undisclosed place to discuss the situation amidst an exodus of non-combatants from the area during the past couple of days. The government had given the 15-day deadline to a jirga which visited Peshawar on June 6 and met the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa governor and Peshawar corps commander. Later, the tribal elders held several meetings with the Taliban council to persuade them to prepare a joint strategy for ousting militants, including foreigners, from the area. Following a meeting with Gul Bahadur, the Taliban Shura asked militants to stay peacefully or vacate the area, vowing not to allow them to create unrest. On the other hand, the administration imposed a dawn-to-dusk curfew which triggered panic among the people. The move also halted the displacement of people during the time. The scared tribal people continued hoisting national flags on their houses in Miramshah and Mirali to demonstrate their loyalty to Pakistan and avoid bombing by the security forces. At least 361 tribal families, comprising 6,343 people, have crossed into Afghanistan to avoid a conflict and have been registered by the Afghan government. The governor of the neighbouring Khost province, Abdul Jabbar, has announced that ration and monetary assistance of 50,000 afghanis will be provided to the tribesmen who have taken refugee there. A local driver, Abdullah, who had taken a family from Miramshah to Khost via Ghulam Khan, told Dawn that a camp for the migrants had been set up on the directives of the governor.