Terror camps have made our lives hell, say PoK residents

Terror training camps have been thriving in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir for years, according to people living across the area who have shown resentment to the Pakistan's intelligence agency, Inter-Services Intelligence for having made their region a haven for anti-social elements.

Residents of Muzaffarabad, Kotli, Chinari, Mirpur, Gilgit, Diamer and various parts of the Neelum Valley say that their lives have been made a living hell by the terror training camps as the lawless men, who train here, plunder local villages and molest the women of the area.

They say that their region is being used by the ISI for its proxy war against India.

In various interactions, people and leaders in the region spoke about the daily extortion and harassment caused by the terror groups who are located near the Line of Control.

"If management doesn't end Taliban's terror camps and 'no-go' areas in Diamer, Gilgit, Baseen and others, then we will take action," a local leader of Gilgit said.

Residents confirm that the region is being used as nothing more than a staging post for Pakistan's proxy war against India. People say they have no sympathy for the terror groups who are perhaps hated more in PoK than anywhere else.

PoK leaders like Arif Shahid exposed the ISI-terror nexus in the region and paid for it with their lives.

Shahid used to say that the poor people of Pakistan are being exploited by the ISI to wage a Jihad against India in which only the Pakistan Army is interested.

Shahid fought tooth and nail against Pakistan's oppression in PoK before he was shot dead outside his residence in Rawalpindi on May 14, 2013. He was 62. The investigation into Shahid's murder is still inconclusive, and there is no closure to the cold-blooded murder, so far. The ISI is blamed for conspiring and executing Shahid's murder.

The people of PoK have been demanding the removal of terror camps for years but the state has always turned a deaf ear.

PoK, earlier also witnessed a series of protests by residents against rigged polls that saw Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's party, the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz, coming to power.

IMAGE: PoK residents hold protest rally against atrocities committed by Pakistani Army. Photograph: ANI/Twitter