KP Police cracks down against illegal arms smuggling

PESHAWAR: Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Police on Wednesday declared seizure of a large cache of weapons that were being smuggled out of the province.

Following the Peshawar Army Public School attack late last year, security across Pakistan has been beefed up. Apex committees have been formed to improve coordination and implementation of the National Action Plan (NAP) in the provinces.

The latest crackdown against illegal weapons began after the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa police raised the issue of illegal arms from the tribal areas making their way across the country via Peshawar, during a recent apex committee meeting.

Police stopped a truck on Kohat road and seized 50 sub-machine guns and 600 12-guage pump action repeaters.

According to police officials, there are many routes which are unmanned by security forces that allow smugglers to bring illegal arms from factories in Darra Adam Khel to the provincial capital Peshawar, from where they are smuggled across Pakistan.

“When they come out from the Darra area, there are 3 or 4 routes on the Teela Band side where the police is not present at all times, there is another route on the Bara Kaka Khel side” DSP Saddar Circle, Abid ur Rehman told Geo News.

Darra: An overview

Darra Adam Khel, just 40-kilometers south of the provincial capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa has over 1000 illegal arms production units; some are single-room operations. The economy of Darra Adam Khel relies purely on arms production and sales.

According to estimates hundreds of weapons are produced in Darra Adam Khel on a daily basis. These include copies of popular assault rifles, sub-machine guns, hand guns, pen-pistols, hand-grenades and even anti-aircraft guns.

The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Police continues its crackdown against illegal factories in the tribal areas as well as arms-dealers in the provincial capital that are found dealing in illegal weapons.