NORTH WAZIRISTAN: Remains of a human body, purportedly of a schoolteacher missing for over 12 years, were found here by some labourers working on the expansion of Dosali-Garyum Road.

Official sources said during digging for the road project the labourers had found some bones and few belongings including a national identity card of one Mohammad Salam, who had allegedly gone missing over a decade ago.

The remains were handed over to a son of the deceased named Shaukat Khan, which were buried in Khushali village in Mirali.

Family members of the missing person said that he was taken away by unidentified persons in 2008 following which his whereabouts were not known.

Official sources said Mohammad Salam, who was around 60 when he had gone missing, was the same person in whose residence a missing journalist, Hayatullah Khan had taken shelter for a brief time when he had escaped from his captors in 2006.

Late Hayatullah was kidnapped by unidentified gunmen in Dec 2005 and in Jun 2006 his body carrying bullet marks was found.

A judicial inquiry was conducted into the kidnapping and killing of Hayatullah through a judge of Peshawar High Court, but despite passage of over a decade the said inquiry report has not been made public by the successive governments.

Published in Dawn, March 6th, 2021