PESHAWAR: An assembly of political leaders and tribal elders on Wednesday rejected the government’s decision to launch a new anti-terrorism operation, calling for peace in the country’s militancy-hit tribal areas.
The jirga is a term used to describe an all-male council in Pakistan’s tribal areas responsible for settling disputes and announcing decisions based on local laws and customs.
Members of the civil society, youth, tribal elders and various political parties attended the jirga called by the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party in Peshawar to discuss the “Azm-e-Istehkam” anti-terrorism operation announced by the government last week.
Pakistan’s top national security forum on Saturday announced it was launching Operation Azm-e-Istehkam or Resolve for Stability, to root out militants in the country. The decision was criticized, with the PTI and Jamiat Ulama-e-Pakistan-Fazl (JUI-F) parties accusing the government of not taking them into confidence about the move.
Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif sought to allay the opposition’s concerns on Tuesday, saying that contrary to previous military operations, the government was not launching a large-scale operation that would cause people to be displaced from their homes. Sharif clarified that the new operation only seeks to energize intelligence-based operations already taking place in the country.
“If there isn’t peace in [erstwhile] Federally Administered Tribal Areas, peace in Pakistan is not possible,” Asad Qaiser, a PTI leader and former speaker of the National Assembly, told members of the jirga.
“We don’t accept any kind of military operation and we will not leave the tribal people alone.”
Muhammad Iqbal Khan Afridi, another PTI lawmaker and the host of the jirga, noted militancy has once again returned to Pakistan’s northwestern tribal districts.
“The jirga is called to raise voice for the restoration of the peace in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, especially in [ex] FATA,” he said.
Afridi said it was the state’s responsibility to ensure peace in the tribal areas.
Malak Jalal, a tribal elder from Pakistan’s restive North Waziristan district, opposed any new military operation in the country.
“It has been more than 20 years that the region is in a state of war,” Jalal said. “We have given sacrifices but we don’t want any kind of operations on our land.”
He recalled how people in many cities and villages of northwestern Pakistan were displaced when the army launched operations in the late 2000s to drive away the Pakistani Taliban.
“We were displaced and our houses were destroyed during the past military operations,” Jalal noted. “We will not tolerate any kind of military operation.”
CONSENSUS ON MILITARY OPERATION
Pakistan’s Defense Minister Khawaja Asif on Tuesday clarified that the government would build consensus in parliament over the military operation before enforcing it.
“The opposition parties and the government’s allies will be given a suitable amount of time to debate it and their questions and reservations will be answered,” Asif told reporters at a news conference.
The minister said the government did not want to achieve any “political objectives” through the operation. Rather, he said it wanted to combat the surge in militancy in the country and eliminate it for good.
Pakistan has blamed the recent surge in militant attacks on neighboring Afghanistan, which it says allows Pakistani Taliban militants to hold camps and train insurgents to launch attacks inside Pakistan.
Kabul denies this. Since last November, the Pakistan government has also launched a deportation drive under which over 600,000 Afghan nationals have been expelled from Pakistan.
