05 March 2004	Friday	13 Muharram 1425

PESHAWAR, March 4: Two Khasadars (tribal volunteers) were injured on Thursday after their vehicle was wrecked by an explosive device placed surreptitiously underneath their vehicle in the South Waziristan Agency, officials said.

Official said the device, which appeared to be a 'magnetic bomb' or a remote-controlled explosive device, placed underneath the Datsun pick-up went off at around 9.30am in the Wana Bazaar. The condition of both the injured Khasadars was stated to be stable.

The explosion occurred after suspected religious extremists fired two rockets at a fort used by the Frontier Corps in the Ladha sub-division on the borders with the North Waziristan Agency. The rockets were fired at around 11.00pm and failed to cause any damage, officials said.

"It shows the extent of these people's (religious extremists) desperation", Mohammad Azam Khan, administrator of the South Waziristan told Dawn. Hundreds of Dir Scouts are reported to have reached the region to help the authorities in what they describe the search and cordon operation against foreign militants.

Also on Thursday, authorities turned back a parliamentarian from the tribal area along with office-bearers of the Jamaat-I- Islami after denying them the permission to hold a public meeting in Wana, South Waziristan's deputy administrator Rehmatullah Wazir said.

Haroon Rashid, a member of National Assembly from the Bajaur tribal region, who is also the region's JI's Ameer, and the party's deputy general secretary, Zar Noor Afridi, had spent the night in Wana in a bid to hold a public meeting.

Mr Wazir said he had called Haroon Rashid at his hosts' residence and tried to dissuade him from holding a political rally. But Mr Wazir said the MNA was adamant about holding a rally to criticise the government's operation against Al Qaeda remnants.

"He insisted that he should either be arrested or be allowed to hold a public rally", the deputy administrator said. He said that he later escorted the MNA along with his party colleagues out of South Waziristan tribal region.

He denied that the tribal parliamentarian or his party colleagues had been arrested or detained. A Jamaat-I-Islami press release issued here, however, claimed that the MNA accompanied by party members was arrested in Wana.

"Governor Syed Iftikhar Hussain Shah has turned the tribal region into an American state. Gen Iftikhar and President Musharraf are conquering their own people to serve the interests of the United States", the statement alleged.