Peshawar News

Asfandyar stresses joint Pak-Afghan efforts to fight terror Tuesday, October 28, 2008 Bureau report PESHAWAR: Central President of the Awami National Party and Chairman Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs Asfandyar Wali Khan has said Pakistan and Afghanistan should jointly combat terrorism as peace and normalcy in both the neighbouring countries are co-related. According to a press release issued by Bacha Khan Markaz Monday, the ANP leader was addressing party workers and Pakhtuns community living in Sweden. NWFP Minister for Schools and Literacy Sardar Hussain Babek, Khan Gul Jadoon and ANP organizer in Europe Johar Afridi also addressed the function. Asfandyar Wali Khan said the Pakhtuns were fighting a war for their survival as an alien war had been imposed on their soil wherein the ultimate victims were the local people and tribesmen, living on both sides of the Pak-Afghan border. “We have to face the current situation with strong will and determination to save our soil from the foreign insurgents,” he added. He said the schools, colleges, hospitals, seminaries and even mosques were being bombed and destroyed by those who could not see the Pakhtun children getting modern education. “Our innocent children and youth were brain-washed and being used as suicide bombers against their own people,” he said, adding that as a nation, we have to collectively fight the battle against terrorism and its propagators. The ANP leader said there would be no peace and stability in the region unless Pakistan and Afghanistan joined hands against terrorism. He said the ANP-led government in the NWFP still preferred negotiations to the use of force, however, the militants should first lay down arms while agreeing for agreement with government.