July 19, 2007	Thursday	Rajab 03, 1428

MANSEHRA, July 18: The federal government has asked national and international NGOs working in quake-hit districts of the NWFP to limit their field activities and adopt extra security measures in view of the situation in the province, Dawn has learnt.

NGOs stopped working in Allai and Battagram following ransacking of their offices. They shifted their offices to Mansehra and Abbottabad. Foreign staff of NGOs has been shifted to Islamabad and elsewhere in the country, but their local staffers are carrying on their routine activities in Mansehra.

The federal government through the chief secretary has written to NGOs to limit their field activities and adopt extra security measures.

“Though personnel of the Frontier Constabulary and police have been deployed in and around the Gazikot town, but we are still cautious,” an official of an international NGO told Dawn.

“Because of the tense situation in the NWFP, law-enforcement agencies are on high alert in the province, but you should also take extra precautionary measures to make sure the safety of your staff and offices and limit your high-profile activities,” he quoted the chief secretary as saying in the letter.

Unicef’s communication officer Abdul Sami Malik told this correspondent by telephone from Islamabad that after the ransacking of a warehouse of Unicef in Battagram last week, the United Nations Security Department advised Unicef and other UN agencies to close their offices in Battagram.