Their belongings piled high on buses, rickety donkey carts and tractors, thousands of refugees poured out of Pakistan’s North Waziristan yesterday, terrified by both state troops and Taliban insurgents fighting for control of the troubled region.
Pakistan announced the start of a full-on military offensive on Sunday to quash an increasingly assertive Taliban insurgency in the ethnic Pashtun region, the base of some of the country’s most feared al Qaeda-linked militants.
Troops have since encircled the mountainous region on the Afghan border and fighter jets have pounded villages and militant hideouts, sending a wave of panicked refugees spilling into the nearby region of Bannu, as well as Afghanistan.
For tens of thousands of people now massing in camps and private houses in Bannu, living under army control was as frightening a prospect as living in the Taliban’s shadow.
“Waziristan was our paradise but the Taliban and security forces turned it into a hell,” said Khair Mohammad, 48, a farmer who brought 20 members of his extended family to Bannu in a wagon pulled by a tractor.
“I didn’t want to leave but my children developed serious mental problems because of the bombings by fighter jets and heavy artillery shelling by security forces there.”
The Pakistani Taliban are deeply entrenched in the complex tribal patchwork of North Waziristan’s society, blending into the populace and hard to distinguish from ordinary residents.
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and his government have tried to engage those they see as moderate Taliban in ceasefire talks but those efforts collapsed after a dramatic Taliban attack this month on Pakistan’s biggest airport in Karachi.
Some refugees said the most feared militants had disappeared overnight as soon as the operation was announced.
“It’s very strange that those Taliban considered as anti-state disappeared mysteriously, but security forces continued to conduct raids on our houses and harass innocent people,” said bank manager Wali Khan, 47.
“Why didn’t they come out of their walled (army) compounds when the Taliban fighters were still in the town?”
He said he and other refugees had enough time to pack only the essentials for their journey and no one could say when they might be able to return home.
Breaking into tears, Khan added: “If I could, I would have brought my cow and other cattle. We left them behind and it was like leaving children behind.”
Residents of the North Waziristan capital of Miranshah said more than two-thirds of families had left by Thursday, with some disappearing into the mountains.
Long queues stretched out of refugee centers where residents must register before leaving, as people waited for hours under the scorching sun. Women, some barefoot, used their head-to-toe burkas to shield children from the heat.
The Pakistani army has launched daily air strikes in North Waziristan but a full-scale ground offensive has yet to start.