PESHAWAR, March 13: Pukhtunkhwa Milli Awami Party chairman Mahmood Khan Achakzai on Saturday warned that intelligence agencies' interference in politics will 'lead to the breakup of the country'.

Speaking at a press conference at the Peshawar Press Club, where paediatric surgeon Said Alam Mehsud announced his joining of the PMAP, Mr Achakzai alleged that the installation of corrupt elements on the elected forums by secret agencies had made a mockery of the democratic system in the country.

He said these agencies were deceiving the outside world by presenting political non-entities and corrupt elements as the true representatives of people.

He underlined the need for putting a ban on the involvement of bureaucracy and armed forces in power politics.

He said the Pukhtunkhwa Milli Awami Party had been struggling for the supremacy of parliament over the armed forces, administration, judiciary and a free press, and added that it wanted these institutions answerable to parliament.

Opposing the military operation in South Waziristan, Mr Achakzai said tribesmen were innocent people who had provided shelter to Afghan and Arab fighters brought in the area by the ISI and the CIA during the war imposed on Afghanistan by the defunct Soviet Union.

"I believe that some foreigners are living in Fata. But whose babies are they? Who is responsible for their presence in Fata? The United States and its regional clients are responsible for human trafficking from the Arab, African and Central Asian states during the Afghan war," he said.

In reply to a question, he said if the Pukhtun leadership of Kabul, Peshawar and Quetta would have taken a united stand in 1947, the Pukhtun political map would have been different today.

Mr Achakzai said smaller nations wanted control over their resources and added that they wanted to live in peace with Punjab on equal footings and not as subservient to it.