Author:
Publication: Rediff on Net
Date: October 27, 2001
Close to 10,000 Pakistani tribesmen
armed with automatic weapons, swords and axes set out in a 100-truck convoy
to join the Taleban militia in its fight against the United States, an
agency report quoting a Pakistan interior ministry official said.
"Led by Soofi Mohammad, head of
Tehreek Nifaz-eSharia Mohammadi, the tribesmen are close to the Afghan
border in Bajur tribal area," the interior ministry official was quoted
as saying.
Bajur is in the Northwest Frontier
Province of Pakistan.
A Tehreek spokesman Qazi Ihsanullah
said, "We will resist if the authorities try to stop us. The jihad will
start here."
The report said extra paramilitary
troops had been sent to tribal districts bordering Afghanistan.
Meanwhile, another agency report
said authorities headed north to reclaim control of Pakistan's portion
of the fabled Silk Route after pro-Taleban militants blocked it with boulders
and planted land mines along its shoulders.
The Pakistani part of the mountainous
road, called the Karakoram Highway, was also blocked with hundreds of tribesmen
and militants, authorities said.
