Hundreds of tribesmen from Khyber tribal region were staging a sit-in protest on Wednesday in front of the Governor House in Peshawar, carrying the coffins of 15 relatives found dead in the tribal region’s Bara tehsil the previous night.
The 400 to 500 tribesmen, who have marched from Bara to the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provincial capital, carrying the bodies of the deceased in pick-ups and demanding justice for the victims.
The protestors accuse security forces of the killings and demand that the Governor and authorities provide them justice. Security forces claim that the militant group Lashkar-i-Islam, led by Mangal Bagh, is behind the murders.
Peshawar’s main Railway Road was blocked for traffic due to the protest. Traffic on Sunheri Mashid and Peshawar Cantt roads was also suspended and security forces had sealed the entire cantonment area to stop protestors from entering the red security zone.
Protestors carried placards and banners calling for an end to the ongoing military operation in their areas. The tribesmen also protest that undirected mortar bombs and artillery shelling has also killed a number of innocent people in their area. Security forces denied the allegations, claiming that the dead included a former Frontier Corps soldier’s father and four brothers – all five gunned down by militants on Tuesday night, they claimed.
Military sources said that militants from the banned Lashkar-i-Islam group had raided the house in Dogra area of former FC-man, Shabbir Ahmed, and gunned down his father and brothers.
“I was a government servant but I don’t know why this injustice done to me,” former FC official, Shabbir, who was also among the protestors outside the Governor House.
“I am serving the nation and working for the security of the country but don’t know why and who has killed my four brothers and father. The government must answer why this has been done to me,” he said.
Security forces claimed they had also launched a counter-attack after militants attacked several check-posts, killing six soldiers and injuring 28 others on Tuesday. Four militants were also killed in the clashes, they said. The officials claimed that Lashkar-i-Islam militants, dressed in FC uniforms, were also involved in the killings of innocent tribesmen in a bid to malign the security forces.
They also further denied that any operation was carried out by the FC force in the area where the bodies were found.
PM takes notice
Prime Minister Raja Pervez Ashraf, taking notice of the protest in Peshawar, telephone KP Governor Masood Kausur and directed him to address the protesters’ grievances. The PM expressed his condolences for the victims’ families, adding that the federal government would extend its full support to the aggrieved.
