JALALABAD (PAN): For the second time, two tribes in the eastern province of Nangarhar clashed over government land, officials said on Thursday.
The predawn fighting erupted at 3:00 am between the Ali Sher Khel and Sepai tribes in Achin and Spinghar districts, said the commander of the eastern zone border police.
Brig. Gen. Aminullah Amarkhel told Pajhwok Afghan News the clash was ongoing until 9.00am. There was no information yet about casualties, he said.
Amarkhel ordered the police who went to the area to halt the gunbattle to fire on any side that attacked them.
Provincial police chief Brig. Gen. Ali Shah Paktiawal confirmed the incident, but declined to give further details.
No one knew who initiated the fighting, an Ali Sherkhel tribal elder, Mullah Jan, said. He also said he had taken three injured people to Jalalabad Civil Hospital.
But the head of Nangarhar Public Health Director Dr. Baz Mohammad Sherzad said there were only two casualties of the fighting at the hospital.
Malak Osman, a Sepai tribal elder, also contradicted Jan’s account, claiming that Ali Sherkhel fighters started the battle after pushing one kilometre into the Sepai area.
Osman claimed that none of his fighters had been injured in the battle, and that some Ali Sher Khel men had surrendered to them.
Last year, more than 10 people suffered casualties in clashes between the two tribes over government land in Achin, Spin Ghar and Ghanikhel districts of the province.
Brig. Gen. Aminullah Amarkhel said on Wednesday the border police should be guarding the frontier rather than stopping fighting between the tribes. “If high-ranking officials allow me, we can disarm both sides in one hour.”
An advisor to President Karzai, Asadullah Wafa, led a delegation to Jalalabad to help end the fighting but did not succeed.
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