Kunar jail inmates call off hunger strike

ASADABAD (PAN): Inmates at the central jail in eastern Kunar province on Thursday called off a four-day hunger strike after they were assured by the governor that their problems would be resolved.

The prisoners had been denying food at the facility in Asadabad, the provincial capital, to push for the implementation of a presidential decree reducing their jail terms.

They called off the strike after Governor Shujaul Mulk Jalala, accompanied by some provincial officials, visited the jail and held talks with the protesting inmates.

Jalala assured the inmates their complaints would be conveyed to President Hamid Karzai and other high officials in Kabul and that he would try to resolve their problems.

“If jail terms of prisoners in Nangarhar, Laghman, Kapisa, Paktia and other provinces have been reduced in compliance with presidential decrees, I would obtain a special decree for you,” the governor told the prisoners.

He told the inmates they would be treated the way prisoners were treated in other provinces and there would be no discrimination against them.

“Tell me if you have any problem that will be resolved,” Jalala said, as the prisoners announced an end to their hunger strike.

One of the inmates, Ihsanullah, said they called off the strike after the governor endorsed all their demands.

Another prisoner, Muhibullah, said more than 70-year-old individuals were held at the prison against the presidential directives.

He said there were several others prisoners whose jail terms had ended, but remained behind bars.

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