QUETTA, Jan 29: Provincial Governor Owais Ahmed Ghani has said that security forces' deployment in Sui was on a permanent and long-term basis to protect the national installations and the provincial government has been taken into confidence.

He said the miscreants who had attacked the gas installations could again target the sensitive installations, hence presence of the security forces in Sui was necessary to counter such acts.

Talking to newsmen on Saturday after a Small and Medium Enterprises Development Authority (Smeda) workshop, he asserted that the situation in Sui was normal and peaceful. No military operation had been launched in that area nor there was any need for such an action, he added.

Mr Owais said the provincial cabinet, which was given a briefing in the Corps headquarters on Saturday, would visit Sui on Sunday to review the situation in Dera Bugti district.

He claimed that Nawab Akbar Bugti had said that his tribesmen were not involved in the rocket attacks on the gas installations, therefore, the Jamhoori Watan Party leader should cooperate with the government in apprehending the miscreants.

He said 675 rockets were fired in one week, damaging the gas supply installations, hitting the Sui airport building a day before his trip to Dera Bugti to meet Nawab Bugti and killing the army men in Khuzdar.

He said statements had been made about the military operation which were contrary to the fact, and urged the newspapers not to highlight one-sided versions.

Shahab Khwaja, the chief executive of the Smeda, and Sardar Mohammad Ali Jogezai, the vice-president of the FCCI, also spoke on the occasion.