Taliban ban on polio vaccination threatens 2.4 lakh children
Peshawar,
Jul 14: The ban imposed on polio vaccination programme by the Taliban
has put 2.4 lakh children in the troubled northwestern Pakistan at risk.
Officials warned on Friday that the vaccination programme needed to be
started next week urgently to save these children.
Local Taliban
and Pakistani warlord Hafiz Gul Bahadur, whose outfit is fighting the
western troops in the neighbouring Afghanistan, have imposed the ban on
polio vaccinations in the tribal region of Waziristan to protest the
continuing US drone attacks against militants. They have termed the
vaccination campaign as a cover for espionage.
A government health
official said the campaign might have to be suspended in North and
South Waziristan for there was no clearance from the army. "The
situation is not conducive," he said, adding that any attempt to defy
the Taliban threats would put their staff in great danger. The Taliban
suspicion that the polio campaign would be used as an espionage cover
has been strengthened more after Pakistani doctor Shakil Afridi helped
the CIA track Osama bin Laden using a hepatitis vaccination campaign as a
cover.
Fawad Khan, health services director in the tribal belt
said 1,60,000 children in North Waziristan and 80,000 in South
Waziristan would be left at peril if the vaccination programme is not
carried out in those areas. He said efforts were underway to reach a
settlement with the Taliban but the health workers were yet to get a
'go-ahead' signal.
A senior security official said elder tribal
members would take up the matter to find out ways of launching the
important campaign. The official said it would not be difficult to
vaccinate the children in South Waziristan
where the Pakistan Army had fought the Taliban three years ago. "The
campaign can be carried out at least in places where the previously
displaced people have returned," he said.
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