PESHAWAR, April 9: The People’s Party Parliamentarians has demanded of the federal government to order the formation of a grand jirga in order to stop acts of lawlessness in Parachinar and other parts of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata).

Speaking at a news conference at the Peshawar Press Club on Monday, Fata president of PPP and former state minister Malik Waris Khan Afridi said that clashes between tribesmen and foreign guerillas hiding in South Waziristan, fighting between members of Lashkar-i-Islam and Ansarul Islam in the Khyber Agency and clashes between two sects in the Kurram Agency were all inter-related. The problems had been engineered by the government to divide the people along different lines so dictatorship could become even more powerful, he claimed.

PPP Provincial Senior Vice-President Syed Qamar Abbas, Syed Ayub Shah, Khwaja Yawar Naseer, Ghani Gul Mehsud, Fareed Khan Toofan and a large number of party workers were present on the occasion.

Mr Afridi said although the entire country was confronted with lawlessness, Fata faced an anarchy-like situation as the region had been witnessing bloodletting of all sorts and tribesmen were killing each other on different grounds.