PESHAWAR, June 10: The Darpakhel Dawar tribesmen have accused the Frontier Corps (FC) of occupying 35,000 kanals of land in Miramshah, North Waziristan Agency’s headquarters.

Speaking at a press conference at the press club here on Friday, tribal elder Haji Pashum Din said that the tribe had leased out about 800 kanals of land to the British colonial government at the rate of Rs1,000 per year in 1901.

The colonial government, he said, had acquired the land for a fort housing training facility for paramilitary forces and an airfield that still existed.

He said that the British government had regularly paid rent to the tribe and never tried to encroach upon land adjacent to the leased area.

He said that the agreement had expired four years ago but the FC, which had been using the facilities, had not approached the tribe to renew the lease agreement and, instead, had forcibly occupied 35,000 kanals of adjoining land. He claimed that the occupied land had been converted into a farm.

He said that the FC officials had exploited a land dispute between two tribes in the area and deprived hundreds of tribal families of ownership of the land.

“The government has stationed troops to provide protection to the people, not to grab land,” the tribal elder said, warning that his tribe would migrate to another country if the government did not provide justice to it.

“Our only option to leave the country if the FC did not vacate possession of our land,” Mr Din said.

He said that the elders of the Darpakhel tribe had taken up the issue with the prime minister, corps commander, FC inspector- general, NWFP governor and others but justice had been denied so far.

“The Darpakhel tribesmen hope that Governor Khalilur Rehman will find a solution of the dispute and hand over possession of the land to its owners,” he said.

Other elders of the Darpakhel Dawar tribe were present at the press conference.