Peshawar Jirga Seeks Peace After Pakistan-Afghanistan Deadly Clashes
Tribal Elders and Religious Leaders Gather in Peshawar to Push for Peace Between Two Neighboring Countries
Peshawar – (Web Desk) – A peace meeting is happening in Peshawar on Tuesday. Religious leaders, tribal elders and politicians will sit together. Their goal is simple. They want Pakistan and Afghanistan to stop fighting and talk instead.
The two countries have been clashing for weeks now. It is the worst fighting between them in many years. Dozens of people have died. Thousands have been forced to leave their homes. Pakistan says Afghanistan is sheltering militants who attack inside Pakistan. Afghanistan says that is not true.
The fighting has included airstrikes inside Afghanistan. Both countries did agree to a short ceasefire before Eid. Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Qatar helped make that happen. But the truce ended last week. And the fighting started again.
A Peshawar based think tank called ASPIRE has organized this peace meeting together with a social movement called QIT. Business people, civil society members and tribal leaders from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa will attend.
Organizer Arbab Khizar Hayat said the jirga will bring ideas to reduce tensions. He also said Afghan elders have been asked to hold a similar meeting on their side.
The KP labor minister Faisal Khan Tarakai welcomed the effort. He said his province already faces serious security problems. He wants talks not war. “Wars have been fought for a long time,” he said. “We need to give peace a chance.”
But not everyone is hopeful. Journalist Lehaz Ali covers this region closely. He said the jirga may not change much. The reason is that peace talks with Afghanistan are handled by the federal government in Islamabad. Not by Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. And right now the federal and provincial governments are not on good terms.
So the jirga may speak. But whether anyone in power listens is another question.
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