NOWSHERA: The police Sunday handed over 27 Afghan children to their parents on personal sureties, who were taken into custody when a pickup truck was transporting them to refugee camp in Akora Khattak a day earlier.
The sources said that Awami National Party (ANP) and Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) district presidents Juma Khan and Ijaz Muhammad were returning to their residences after attending a function when they spotted a pickup truck carrying children on the Nowshera-Mardan Road.
The two leaders informed the police who reached the spot, arrested driver and helper and shifted the children to the Nowshera Kalan Police Station.
The police during the preliminary investigation discovered that the children were being transported to various localities in the district for collecting scrap in the morning and return them to the refugee camp at night. The police arrested parents of the children and but they were freed later on personal sureties. The children, aged between 6-12, were also handed over to their parents.
However, the parents and their children would appear before the court today Monday. The parents assured the police that they would send their children to the UNHCR-run and Pakistani schools.