PESHAWAR: Thousands of people on Tuesday held a demonstration in the northwestern Pakistani district of Swat to demand peace and security in the valley, a day after twin blasts at a counter-terrorism facility in killed 17 people and injured 68.
Monday’s explosions were so powerful that they leveled the counter-terrorism police station in Kabal town of Swat district in the northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province that borders Afghanistan.
The incident came amid a renewed wave of militant attacks on police and security forces in Pakistan’s restive northwest, particularly after the Pakistani Taliban, or the outlawed Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), called off their fragile truce with the government in November last year.
The demonstration was jointly arranged by Swat Olasi Pasoon, or Swat People’s Movement, and Swat National Council, with thousands of residents and activists participating in it.
“As [we] witnessed devastation at the police station last night, we have gathered to condemn such kinds of terror acts,” Zia Nasir Yousafzai, a member of the Swat People’s Movement, told Arab News.
People take part in a demonstration a day after twin blasts at a counter-terrorism facility that killed 17 people and injured 68 in Swat, Pakistan, on April 25, 2023. (Photo courtesy: Zia Nasir Yousafzai)
Yousafzai said the protesters condemned militancy and demanded peace and security.
“We are here to tell the authorities that the people of Swat have already paid a heavy price and we will not accept the return of those dark days,” he added.
Yousafzai said the protesters wanted to know who allowed the TTP fighters to return to Swat and once again engage in acts of violence.
The TTP took partial control of Pakistan’s Swat Valley in 2007 before being ousted two years later in a major military operation hailed as a telling blow to militant violence. During this period, the militants unleashed a reign of terror, killing and beheading politicians, singers, soldiers and opponents.
Videos of the protest went viral on social media in which demonstrators could be heard chanting “this terrorism is unacceptable” and “these explosions are unacceptable.”
Officials have blamed Monday’s blasts on a short circuit at the old Counter-Terrorism Department (CTD) building, which housed munitions in its basement.
Zahid Khan, a senior member of the Swat National Council, said people were planning to hold a mammoth demonstration soon after Eid Al-Fitr, but the “mysterious blasts” at the CTD police station forced them to immediately take to the streets to condemn growing insecurity.
He said the demonstrators wanted to send a strong message that the people of Swat would no longer accept the presence of any “terrorist” in their towns.
“We demand a judicial probe to be headed by Justice Qazi Faiz Isa, a senior puisne judge of the Supreme Court of Pakistan, into the CTD police station explosions,” Khan said.
“At first, the police said it was a suicide attack but later, they said the blasts were triggered munition inside the police facility.”
The people of Swat have already paid a heavy price and faced deaths, destruction and mass migration, he said, adding now they had decided that no one would be allowed to a create law and order situation or sabotage peace of the scenic valley.
