PESHAWAR: Amid security threats of militant attacks, Army troops were deployed on Tuesday at Central Jail Peshawar, which holds Dr Shakil Afridi and other high profile Taliban inmates, and Haripur jail.
The military sources confirmed that the troops took over the jail security on the request of the civil administration .
The source added that the deployment would not be for a long period and that the troops would be present at the prisons only to strengthen the security cordon.
Official sources said that the army would also take over the security of the central Jail Haripur for which the intelligence agencies have also issued a threat warning following the recent jailbreak in DI Khan.
Other sources said that though security warning was issued for all the jails in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KPK) province but Central Jail Peshawar could be the prime target as Dr Shakil Afridi who was convicted of assisting the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in obtaining DNA samples of Osama Bin Laden through a fake vaccination campaign was also held in the said prison.
Moreover the founder chief of the outlawed Tehrik Nifaz Sharia-i-Muhammadi (TNSM), Mualana Sufi Mohammad, the former Taliban spokesman Muslim Khan, and a number of other key commanders belinging to the Swat and Bajaur chapter of the Taliban are also jailed in the Peshawar Central Prison.
The KPK government has already allocated Rs198.200 million for strengthening the Jail secuirty across the province and deployment of army troops is an added support to the security cordon.