Peshawar: Hundreds of thousands of Pakistanis displaced by anti-Taliban military operations in tribal areas wish only to return home — but first they have to agree to fight the extremists themselves.
It’s “social engineering” unheard of in the recent war on terror: displace an entire population, fight the insurgents who remain, then bring back those uprooted and charge them with keeping the militants at bay. And this time, North Waziristan’s displaced have little choice but to accept.
June marks one year since the army launched an offensive in this region of northwest Pakistan, which became a refuge for jihadists after the Afghan Taliban was driven from power across the border.
On the Taliban’s fall in 2001, tribal chiefs welcomed them with open arms, or were forced to, transforming the area into a hub for the global jihadi movement, hosting fighters from Al-Qaeda, the Haqqani network and European apprentice militants, targeted by US drone strikes.
But in launching their operation last year, the Pakistani army pushed out hundreds of thousands of ordinary Waziris, who today live in camps, with relatives, or in rented hovels in the tribal areas.
“We know that everything there is destroyed: the bazaars, the houses, the schools and the religious seminaries,” says Malik Khan Marjan, who heads North Waziristan’s tribal alliance and is desperate to go home.
“But we have no information about what exactly is happening there on the ground.” (PTI)
The Pakistani authorities say 67,000 homes in the tribal belt have been completely destroyed, but there has been no independent assessment of the scale of the damage. The country has asked the international community for USD 800 million to “rebuild and rehabilitate” the tribal areas where two million people, out of a total population of 4.6 million inhabitants, have been displaced by the fighting in recent years. But since people were initially allowed to return from March onwards — triggering a process that will be spread out over two years as areas are cleared by the military — less than 300 families have returned to North Waziristan. Indeed, to return at all, residents must sign a “code of conduct” which has left many Waziris angry. The code, officially titled a “social contract”, prescribes that tribes affirm their “loyalty” to Pakistan and recognise their “responsibility” for the proliferation of jihadists in the area in the past decade. (AFP) UZM 05190025
