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Pakistan scrambles to save militant peace deal

PAKISTAN: Pakistan held crisis talks with tribal elders to save a peace deal with pro-Taliban militants, amid fears of fresh violence after three weekend suicide attacks left more than 70 dead.

Thousands of people fled the tense tribal region of North Waziristan, a day after rebels there tore up the controversial peace accord they had struck 10 months ago with the government of President Pervez Musharraf.

Security forces remain on high alert in the wake of the bomb attacks targeting troops and police near the Afghan border in apparent retaliation for last week’s assault on the Red Mosque in Islamabad.

Al-Qaeda and local Islamic hardliners have called for holy war against Musharraf following the two-day raid on the pro-Taliban mosque, in which at least 11 troops and 75 people, mostly militants, were killed.

“The government of Pakistan has not scuttled the deal and negotiations with tribal elders continue,” Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Tasnim Aslam told a media briefing in Islamabad on Monday.

The chief minister of North West Frontier Province, Akram Durrani, said the authorities “will try to save the peace deal with tribal militants and hope they will revise their decision to scrap it.”

“The deal is vital for peace in the area and, God forbid, if it is cancelled the consequences will be dangerous,” Durrani told reporters after a four-hour meeting with tribal elders, religious scholars and lawmakers.

Under the September deal — heavily criticised by Washington and Kabul — the militants had vowed to stop cross-border attacks in war-torn Afghanistan and hunt down foreign insurgents hiding in the lawless mountain areas.

Meanwhile the United States may build safeguards to ensure that aid poured into Pakistan’s tribal areas, does not fall into wrong hands, officials said. The administration of President George W. Bush reportedly plans to pour 750 million dollars worth of aid to the federally administered tribal areas, as the Pakistan region is formally called, in a bid to wrest it away from militants.

The New York Times, citing unnamed officials involved in the planning, highlighted on Monday the dangers of distributing so much money in an area where oversight is impossible.

Who will be given the aid has quickly become one of the most contentious questions between local officials and US planners concerned that millions might fall into the wrong hands, the report said.

But US State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said everyone was well aware that the tribal region bordering Afghanistan was “a difficult operating environment.”

Islamabad, Washington, Tuesday, AFP

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