In two separate shooting attacks on Thursday, gunmen in KURRAM reportedly killed eight people, including seven teachers over land property dispute.
According to reports, Upper Kurram resident Mohammad Sharif was shot and killed in the Shalozan Road neighborhood.
According to authorities, Syed Hussain, Liaquat Hussain, Syed Ali Shah, Mehdi Hussain, Mohammad Ali, Ali Hussain, and another invigilator were killed after gunmen opened fire in an exam room at the Government High School in the Teri Mangal district.
Kurram deputy commissioner Syed Saiful Islam said in a video message that the killings occurred because of a disagreement over land property.
Interim Prime Minister orders report on the attack over land
But the district administration, police, and local elders, he said, were working hard to bring things back under control. The DC has pledged to conduct a thorough inquiry into the murders.
Public hospitals in the Kurram district were placed on emergency status after the killings. Qaiser Abbas, the district hospital’s medical superintendent, told Dawn that the body of the first shooting victim had been released to his family.
An increase in fatalities and injuries prompted him to declare an emergency at the medical facility, he said.
As a precautionary step after the killings, authorities shut down routes throughout the district, and the Board of Intermediate and Secondary Education, Kohat, delayed the ongoing matriculation exam.
Sajid Hussain Turi, the Federal Minister for Overseas Pakistanis, has spoken out against the death of teachers, saying that the attack was carried out with the intention of disrupting tranquility in the area.
According to local news paper’s interviews with local authorities, the conflict between the Gedu and Pewar communities stemmed from a plot of unmarked shamlat land.
It was reported that 16 people had been killed on both sides of the land dispute that began in the 1950s when residents of the Gedu village protested the cutting down of trees in their neighborhood by residents of the Pewar village for use as fuel.
The officials, however, said that the Pewar villagers had been granted permission by a jirga to cut down trees outside of Gedu Mozzah, far from the location of the murders in November of 2022. To further settle the matter, it was determined that the area in question would be demarcated according to the revenue records.
The residents of Gedu, however, pulled out, and the problem remains unsolved. Three members of the Gedu culture were reportedly ambushed by gunmen, with one of them dying. The citizens of Gedu held Pewar responsible for the murders.
A Gedu villager was slain on Thursday in the Upper Kurram region. Teachers were murdered in an examination room as a crowd took revenge.
The province governor and the Kohat commissioner reportedly met with a team to discuss land conflicts in the Kurram tribal district not too long ago. However, they insisted that the plan had been derailed by criminals.
A high-ranking official stated that the property dispute between the two villages was the cause of the bloodshed and not religious intolerance.
Mohammad Azam Khan, the interim chief minister, has denounced the recent deaths related to the land conflict and requested an update on the situation.
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