June 19, 2006	Monday	Jumadi-ul-Awwal 22, 1427

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PESHAWAR, June 18: The Awami National Party has expressed anguish over the killings of journalist Hayatullah Khan in North Waziristan and two women and two children in Orakzai Agency, terming the incidents results of flawed policies regarding Afghanistan and the war on terror.

The party’s executive council said after a meeting held at the Bacha Khan Markaz on Sunday that the federal government was responsible for lawlessness in the tribal area and hundreds of local elders had been killed from Bajaur to Waziristan but the killers were yet to be arrested or identified. It said the tribesmen are fast losing confidence in the government and a feeling of deprivation was growing among them.

The writ of the government was diminishing in the tribal areas and militants were taking control of the affairs there, it said.

The meeting adopted a resolution calling upon the government to arrest the killers of Hayatullah and provide an atmosphere for the pressmen to work fearlessly.

It condemned the killing of women and children in Orakzai Agency. It said targeting of women and children was against Pukhtun traditions. It called for early arrest of the killers and giving them exemplary punishment.

Through another resolution, the ANP expressed concern over excessive loadshedding in the province and said people in some localities in Dera Ismail Khan were without water because of the problem.

It adopted a resolution, criticising supply of gas from the Gurgury area to Punjab. It demanded that the gas should first be supplied to Karak and then to other areas of the NWFP. It said royalty should be paid to the local population for gas supplied to other provinces.

It said deprivation of Balochistan’s people was resulting in an armed conflict.

The party expressed concern over the dilapidated condition of roads in Malakand region and demanded construction of a road network to pave the way for tapping of local natural resources. Due to bad roads the process of development and investment had halted, it lamented.