QUETTA, April 27: Situation remained tense in Gulistan area, some 90 kilometres from here, as death toll rose to five in the gun battle between the law enforcement agencies and armed tribesmen resisting the government operation to destroy poppy crop in the area.

The cross-firing has, however, stopped.Official sources confirmed that four more persons, all tribesmen, succumbed to their injuries late Saturday night.

“The dead include a young girl and a boy whose house was hit by a mortar shell fired by the Frontier Corps men in retaliation,” sources in Gulistan told Dawn.

Provincial Home Secretary Dr Badaruddin Aujan said: “Though there was no firing today, the situation is very tense. We have sent more contingents of the Frontier Corps and Balochistan Reserve Police in view of the situation.”

He said the district administration of Qila Abdullah had entered into negotiations with the elders of the resisting tribesmen and poppy growers. “We are hopeful the situation would ease,” he added. However, he clarified, the government would not stop the operation launched for destroying poppy crop in Gulistan and other areas of the province.

“We have no plan to abandon the operation against poppy growers,” Dr Aujan said, and added that poppy cultivation was a crime and those who violated the law would be dealt with sternly.