Militants in Swat mull lasting truce

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Militants in Swat mull lasting truce
Oluşturulma Tarihi: Şubat 23, 2009 00:00

MINGORA, Pakistan - Pakistani pro-Taliban militants said yesterday they would decide within days whether to call a permanent cease-fire in a wild region near the Afghan border after the government agreed to allow Islamic, or Shariah, law.

But, despite the ongoing peace talks, Islamabad said militants have kidnapped a senior official in a northwestern valley. Police said armed men abducted Khushal Khan and his six security guards as they drove toward the main town in the Swat valley yesterday, according to the Associated Press.

Muslim Khan, a spokesman for militant leader Maulana Fazlullah, confirmed that Pakistani official was with militants. The spokesman described Khushal Khan as a guest but said the militants had unspecified issues with one of the men accompanying the official. Khan also said the hard-liners would review their current 10-day truce in the Swat valley when it runs out on Wednesday. "We declared a 10-day cease-fire just after the agreement was signed and you will see an exemplary peace prevail in the valley once sharia is enforced," Khan told Agence France-Presse.

"In the next five or six days, our Shoora, or council, is meeting and it will decide about a permanent cease-fire," he said. The militants led a deadly campaign to enforce Islamic law until calling a truce last week, when authorities signed a deal recognizing the code in the troubled valley.

No date has been announced for when sharia law would take effect. But deal already provoked alarm in the United States, Europe, Afghanistan and India, where governments are worried it will embolden militants in the North West Frontier Province.
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