LANDI KOTAL (Khyber Agency), Jan 18: A 35-member government-sponsored jirga of tribal elders left for Gogrina on Thursday to help negotiate a peace deal between two warring groups in Tirah.

Apart from people from the Khyber Agency, the jirga included 15 elders from tribal agencies. The jirga members would meet Lashkar-i-Islam leader Mangal Bagh in Gogrina to persuade him for an immediate ceasefire, sources said.

Earlier, Senator Hamidullah Jan held talks with the Lashkar leader but the talks remained inconclusive. Mr Jan told Dawn he was optimistic about brokering a ceasefire but he maintained that Bagh was not prepared to talk to the government-sponsored jirga.

However, officials of the Bara political administration said Bagh himself expressed his willingness to meet what they called the grand Fata jirga.