PESHAWAR: Police in the provincial capital allegedly resorted to firing and tear gas early on Tuesday to disperse a protest by tribesmen from Khyber district against a suspected quadcopter strike that killed a minor girl and injured six others.
The protesters had gathered at the Hayatabad toll plaza to protest the death of a teenage girl in a suspected quadcopter strike in Bara’s Akkakhel area. Six other family members, including women and children, were injured in the attack.
The site of the incident is located close to the Bara Bazaar.
Hashim Afridi, one of the participants, told Dawn that about 150 tribesmen from Bara and other adjacent areas had gathered at the Hayatabad toll plaza to protest the quadcopter strike. He claimed that the police opened fire, apparently over some scuffle near a roadblock.
However, he said there were no casualties, and no arrests were made. He added that Khyber MNA Iqbal Afridi joined the protest later.
MNA Afridi, speaking to Dawn, said the firing began when some protesters broke the windows of a car.
However, he maintained that the protest was peaceful and that the protesters were only seeking to raise their voice against civilians becoming collateral damage.
Afridi added that the people of Khyber were asked to leave Tirah earlier this year, and now “they are being killed in other areas as well”.
The parliamentarian further stressed that tribesmen were powerless in the face of militancy in the region and claimed that the individuals were targeted on the pretext of providing food to militants, questioning how an ordinary person could refuse such a demand.
Afridi also called on the government to fulfil its responsibilities and provide security to the people who were in the crosshairs of militants.
Meanwhile, a senior police officer argued that the police resorted to aerial firing to disperse the mob only after some people within the enraged protestors fired and attempted to torch a police van and smashed the windscreen of a vehicle belonging to a government official who was travelling with his family.
“We had to resort to aerial firing to respond to gunshots and stop the mob from damaging government property. No one was hurt in the firing”, the police official said.
KP Chief Minister Sohail Afridi, who also hails from Khyber district, ordered an inquiry into reports of the police opening fire at the protest, according to an official statement.
He also directed authorities to take strict action against those responsible for the act.
Last week, security forces killed five militants in a major counter-terrorism operation in the Akkakhel area of Bara in Khyber district.
Security officials said that the operation was launched in Tandori village of Akkakhel, bordering Khazankhel village on the outskirts of the provincial capital, Peshawar.
They said that terrorists who had descended from the restive Tirah Valley over the past few weeks had gathered in significant numbers in Tandori village and Khazankhel.
On March 30, security forces killed 10 militants after they seized a government school in the Akkakhel area and hoisted their flag on the school premises.
Earlier in the same month, five children were injured in a quadcopter attack — believed to have been carried out by terrorists — in the Takhtikhel area of KP’s Lakki Marwat district.
Last year in May, four children were killed, and five others, including a woman, were injured in a suspected quadcopter attack in Mir Ali tehsil of North Waziristan district.
