Pakistan's northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhawa (KP) province will block NATO supplies in and from neighboring Afghanistan until the US holds a firm assurance to halt its deadly drone attacks. "Come what may, we will block the NATO supplies. And we will show that to you," an emotionally-charged Imran Khan, the leader of the Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaf (PTI) which rules the KP province, told a press conference in the eastern city of Lahore on Saturday. Khan said he was going to move a resolution in the provincial parliament on Monday and would try to obtain a consensus on halting NATO supplies. "Even if we lose the provincial government, we will not let the NATO supplies pass through Khyber Pakhtunkhawa," he thundered. The cricketer-turned-politician said his provincial government would be within its right to stop NATO supplies. "The Peshawar High Court has already passed a judgment (a year ago) directing federal government to stop NATO supplies if drone strikes were not halted," he noted.
More than 80 percent of NATO supplies trickle into neighboring Afghanistan via Pakistan's southwestern Chaman and northwestern Torkham borders.
Torkham connects Afghanistan's Nangarhar province with KP.
Earlier today, Federal Interior Minister Chaudry Nisar Ali Khan accused the US of sabotaging the country's peace process by killing Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) leader Hakimullah Mehsud along with his two senior lieutenants in a drone strike Friday.
"This is not the murder of a person. This is the murder of peace," he told a press conference.
"This is not an attack on an individual. This is an attack on peace process," asserted the minister.
Mehsud's killing has aborted government plans to initiate negotiations with the Taliban to bring an end to a decade-long homegrown militancy that has killed over 40,000 Pakistanis, including 4,000 security personnel.
Pakistani security forces have been placed on high alert, fearing possible reprisal attacks from Taliban