August 17, 2002	Saturday	Jamadi-us-Saani 7, 1423

Please Visit our Sponsor (Ads open in separate window).

PESHAWAR, Aug 16: Some of the Jihadi organizations, banned by the government, have become active again in the northern parts of the Frontier province.

During a visit to Nathia Gali and its adjoining areas the other day, this scribe witnessed a local leader of a banned Jihadi outfit addressing a small group of people at Ayubia, explaining the need for Jihad in the wake of the post Sept-11 situation.

These smaller groups remain unnoticed by the police posted there to guard the tourist resort of Ayubia. The police appeared to be unmoved even though the speech was being blasted over the loudhailers.

They have also placed donation boxes at Ayubia chairlift.

Hoteliers informed that despite the ban, the activists of the banned group regularly come for donations at Ayubia - a busy tourist resort especially after the chairlift was reopened on Aug 10.

Tour operators in Nathia Gali said that the US-led “war on terrorism” had severely affected tourism in the area, the main source of income for the local people.

Ghayur Ahmad, who runs a gift shop in Nathia Gali said, “foreigners have become a rare “species”. I hardly saw any foreigner in Galyat this season”, he said.

Information gathered by Dawn revealed that before a shift in Islamabad’s internal and external policies, these Jihadi organizations used to collect enormous donations from these areas.

They recruited large number of Jihadis from Hazara division, housing the Galyat areas and established training camps in the forest-rich Hazara division.

Sources said that since the government asked the Jihadi outfits to wind up their training camps, their activists have been active and mobile to keep their nucleus intact.

Some organizations like Hizbul Mujahideen, a sister organization of Jamaat-i-Islami, a radical Islamic party, still has its office in Peshawar.

A source in Mansehra town, some 190kms in the north-east of Peshawar, said that Jihadi organizations had abandoned their training camp, situated in various parts of Hazara division. “Only LT is still active in the area,” the source said.

An office-holder of Al-Badar said that like other groups, his organization also relinquished its camp in Ogahi in March.

He said that a group of foreigners, accompanied by the state agencies, visited various abandoned camps, including Ogahi in April last.