Tribal elders spring into action to restart talks with PTM leaders

In this file photo, leader of Pakistan’s Pashtun Protection Movement (PTM) Manzoor Pastheen speaks during a demonstration in Lahore on April 22, 2018. (AFP)

• Arab News has learned the government has also asked retired military officials and bureaucrats from North and South Waziristan to talk with PTM leaders and address their issues
• PTM has been critical of the country’s security establishment, widening the gulf between their activists and state authorities

ISLAMABAD: A group of tribal elders in Pakistan’s northwestern regions on Monday agreed to meet with leaders of the Pashtun Tahafuz Movement (PTM), a group campaigning for the rights of Pashtun nationals across the country.
A jirga (council of tribal elders) was formed last month to begin talks with PTM leaders, who have become more prominent in recent months as they increased pressure on the government to accept their demands. These include a halt to extrajudicial killings; the recovery and production in courts of missing persons; the removal of land mines from the northwestern tribal region, which has been the scene of a great deal of conflict between militant groups and security forces in recent years; and transfer of responsibility for security checkpoints in these militancy-prone areas to a civil administration.
PTM leaders have also been critical of the country’s security establishment in their speeches, widening the gulf between their activists and state authorities.
Last month, a jirga was formed during a meeting of the Apex Committee presided over by Governor of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) Iqbal Zafar Jhagra and attended by KP Chief Minister Pervez Khattak, Corps Commander of Peshawar Lt. Gen. Nazir Ahmad Butt and other civil and military officials.
The jirga was intended to constructively engage with PTM members and help resolve the issues raised by the group amid rising tensions between the movement and the security agencies. Just as the two sides met, however, PTM leaders demanded “international guarantors” monitor their talks with the government, and the talks stalled.
The tribal elders convened again on Monday. The head of the jirga, Hajji Shah Jee Gul, a member of National Assembly for Khyber Agency, said that a four-member committee had been formed to meet PTM chief Manzoor Ahmed Pashteen and invite him to the next round of talks. The jirga will again meet on May 10 to review progress, he added.
“We will try our best to bring them to the negotiating table and find solutions to their demands, which are in fact the demands of the entire Pashtun community,” said Gul. “The jirga is ready to meet with PTM leaders and find out where the management of the group wants to talk and with whom.”
PTM members, who launched their campaign in February with a sit-in protesting against the killing of tribal youth Naqeebullah Mehsud during a police encounter in Karachi, quickly attracted significant support. The group staged public protests in Peshawar, Lahore and Swat, and is planning a major rally in Karachi on May 12.
Meanwhile, Arab News has learned that the government has also contacted retired military officials and bureaucrats from North and South Waziristan, asking them to talk to PTM and address their issues.
And on Sunday, KP police chief Salahuddin Mehsud visited Makeen in South Waziristan, where he met the Mehsud grand jirga to discuss ways to deal with the situation.