QUETTA, Dec 20: Helicopter gunships continued their attacks on ‘hideouts and camps’ in different areas of the Kohlu district on Tuesday and reports were received about intense fighting between paramilitary forces and Marri tribesmen using heavy weapons.

Meanwhile, a portion of the railway track linking Sibi with Harnai has been blown up and there are reports of rockets and missiles fired in Dera Bugti and Kohlu areas.

Security forces have claimed to have recovered illegal arms and ammunition from a house in Bogara Colony in the Sui town and arrested four people from Sui and Tali areas for firing on paramilitary forces.

Sources said that helicopter gunships had attacked the hideouts of armed tribesmen in the Fazal Chel area, some 25km from Kohlu township. “Helicopters were seen flying towards Fazal Chel area throughout the day,” the sources told Dawn. They said that tribesmen using heavy weapons were resisting the attacks.

The Marri tribesmen claimed that over 70 people had been killed in the three-day operation and many more injured.

Official sources confirmed that paramilitary action was continuing in different areas of Kohlu and it would continue till the ‘goal has been achieved’. They did not give any casualty figure.

It is learnt that 20 injured people have so far been brought to hospitals from the troubled area.

The blowing up of the Sibi-Harnai track caused suspension of train service between the two towns. “A big portion of railway track blew up when a device planted under a small railway bridge exploded,” officials of the Pakistan Railways said.

They said that engineers and other staff were sent to the area for replacing the damaged portion of the track and repairing the bridge.

A passenger train which left for Harnai from Sibi on Monday morning was stopped at the Babar-Kach station after the incident that took place at around 9am.

A spokesman for the Baloch Liberation Army in Sibi claimed responsibility for blowing up the track. “It is retaliation against the operation launched in the Marri area,” he said in a latter sent to the Sibi Press club.

The sources said that some people fired rockets and missiles at the positions of Frontier Corps in Dera Bugti and the DCO office Kohlu early in the morning.

“Four missiles fired from mountains landed in the FC Fort in Dera Bugti and exploded in an open place causing no loss of life or property,” an FC spokesman said.

He also confirmed that two rockets had been fired on the Kohlu township early in the morning which exploded close to the DCO office. “The wall of the office was damaged and windowpanes of several government buildings were shattered.”

He said the arms and ammunition seized from a house in Sibi included 70 rockets, 6 rocket launchers, machine-guns, hundreds of rounds of ammunition and explosive material.

A statement issued by the Anjuman Ittehad Marri said that planes and helicopter gunships bombed different areas, especially Jandran and Bhimbore, for the fifth consecutive day.

It said that the armed men were defending themselves.

The statement said that fresh troops with tanks and artillery had been dispatched from Dera Ghazi Khan via the Barkhan district to speed up the army operation in Kohlu.

In a related development, a delegation of the four-party Baloch Alliance met representatives of political groups and formally invited them to attend a conference of democratic and nationalist political parties on Wednesday to formulate a course of action against the military operation in Kohlu and search operation in Dera Bugti.

Alliance leader Agha Shahid Hasan Bugti told Dawn that preparations had been completed to observe a ‘black day’ and hold a demonstration outsides the press club on Wednesday.

He said the Jamhoori Watan Party, Balochistan National Party-Mengal and National Party had separately held meetings of their respective bodies and discussed matters relating to the observance of the black day.

The Baloch Alliance delegation is believed to have delivered formal invitations to the PPP, Pukhtunkhwa Milli Awami Party, Awami National Party, PML-N and Hazara Democratic Party to attend the conference to be held in the MPA hostel in Quetta.

STRIKE CALL: Meanwhile, the Baloch Students Organization (Asif group) on Tuesday gave a call for shutter-down and ‘wheel-jam’ strike in Balochistan on Dec 24 and 25, respectively.

Speaking at a press conference here, BSO-A Chairman Asif Baloch warned the government that if atrocities against the Baloch were not stopped then they too would take the path of violence.

BAR RESOLUTION: The Balochistan Bar Association condemned the operation and called for ending violence to resolve the political issues politically instead of through extra-constitutional ways.

A general body meeting of the association held with Muhammad Wasay Tareen in the chair adopted a resolution criticizing the military operation in Kohlu and reinforcement of security forces in the Dera Bugti areas.

Through another resolution, the association asked the government to drop the plan of building the Kalabagh dam as it had been rejected by provincial assemblies of Sindh, NWFP and Balochistan.

It also condemned ‘illegal’ detention of political activists by intelligence agencies and asked the government to either frame formal charges against the detainees or free them forthwith.