HYDERABAD, Aug 12: The Human Rights Education Forum on Sunday appealed to the Chief Justice of Pakistan to take suo moto notice of raging tribal wars, illegal jirgas, worsening law and order and police failure to protect common man’s right to life, liberty and security in Shikarpur district.

In a communication addressed to the chief justice, the forum’s president, Iqbal Ahmed Detho, said that people in the district were living under the pernicious shadow of tribal wars among a number of tribes, particularly Mahars and Jatois.

These wars had claimed innumerable innocent lives and led to accumulation of prohibited weapons like machine-guns, AK-47 rifles and rocket-launchers in the area, he said.

He claimed that the warring tribes were freely using notorious bandits against each other to perpetuate a reign of terror with the active backing of their respective MNAs, MPAs and influential people. Despite ban on holding jirgas imposed by the Sukkur circuit bench of the Sindh High Court in April 2004, the government officials, in inclusion with tribal chiefs, had been openly holding jirgas in the district with no fear of getting caught.

Mr Detho said that the fire of revenge had engulfed not only the warring tribes it often dragged into the inferno the innocent people on either side who had nothing to do with the bloody disputes. All the organs of the state appeared powerless before the chieftains in whose interest it was to keep the fire of revenge raging, he said.

He said that the tribal wars were a clear violation of fundamental human rights as they led to deprivation of rights of law abiding people enshrined in the constitution.