MUZAFFARABAD, June 15: Kashmiri leaders from occupied region will return home on Thursday after their two-week visit of Azad Kashmir and Pakistan. Their departure would take place about two hours after the regular batch of passengers from the AJK would cross the Opi Bridge in Chakothi sector, some 61km south of Muzaffarabad, Deputy Commissioner Liaquat Hussain told Dawn.

According to him, the leaders would pay a visit to Ambore refugee camp on the outskirts of Muzaffarabad shortly after landing here on Thursday morning. There, they will address the refugees who fled their homes in held Kashmir and crossed the LoC after 1990 due to unrelenting Indian repression.

After their arrival on June 2, the Kashmiri leaders spent two days in Muzaffarabad and left for Pakistan where they interacted with the Pakistani leadership and intelligentsia in different cities. During the period, they flew into three AJK towns and addressed big public meetings.

Some pro-independence groups had organized a public meeting in Muzaffarabad on Wednesday evening and JKLF chairman Yaseen Malik was to be the chief guest.

But Mr Malik could not turn up at the public meeting on account of what he told the audience in a brief telephonic address from Islamabad his bad health. The DC told Dawn that on return from the refugee camp, the Kashmiri leaders would hold a meeting with AJK Prime Minister Sardar Sikandar Hayat. Before leaving for Chakothi by cars they would have an informal press talk.