THE traders association of Chitral in Pakistan’s troubled NWFP has asked the government not to make Chitrali police a scapegoat in its ongoing fight with Taliban militants in Swat and other parts of the province.
Traders’ Union president Habib Husain Mughal while reacting to the government order to send an additional platoon of police from Chitral to Swat said when police in the adjacent district of Dir had refused to go to Swat why Chitralis’ sons should be made a scapegoat. He said culturally and geographically people of Dir and other districts were more homogenous to Swat than Chitralis who even cannot speak the Pashto language.
Chitral with its area of 14,850 square-km is the biggest district of the NWFP and there is already shortage of police in the valley to maintain law and order. He said Taliban militants were knocking at the doors of Chitral and if stringent measures were not taken on time, the militants can move into the district from the neighboring Swat and other areas and spoil the peace of the valley.
He also criticized deployment of Chitral Scouts in the violence-hit areas of the province. He said bodies of Chitral Scouts and police personnel have been arriving from the troubled areas and the people of Chitral were not ready to see their sons being sent to the far-off areas to fight the militants and being killed.