Martyred SP Tahir Dawar laid to rest in Peshawar

The funeral prayers of martyred Superintendent of Police (SP) Tahir Khan Dawar were offered at Police Lines in Peshawar on Thursday evening after a Pakistani delegation received his body from Afghan officials at the Torkham border earlier in the day.

Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Governor Shah Farman, Chief Minister Mahmood Khan, Minister of State for Interior Shehryar Afridi, KP police chief Salahuddin Khan Mahsud, KP Information Minister Shaukat Yousufzai, and provincial spokesperson Ajmal Wazir attended the funeral of the official.

Dawar’s family hold a separate funeral in Hayatabad, after which he was laid to rest at a graveyard in Phase-7 area of the locality.

SP Dawar, chief of Peshawar police’s rural circle, was kidnapped in the G-10/4 area of Islamabad on October 26, and later his body was found in a remote area of the Afghan province of Nangarhar.

According to Radio Pakistan, the Afghan officials had initially refused to hand over the police officer’s body to Pakistani authorities. However, they later handed over the body to a delegation of tribal leaders.

Shehryar Afridi and Shaukat Yousafzai, along with MNA Mohsin Dawar were also present at Torkham to receive the body of Tahir Dawar.

The martyred police officer’s body was then dispatched to Peshawar via a helicopter, where his funeral prayers were offered at Police Lines at around 9pm. Peshawar Corps Commander Lt General Shaheen Mazhar Mahmood, Commandant Frontier Constabulary Moazzam Ansari, and other high-ranking law enforcement officials were also in attendance.

The Director General of Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), Maj Gen Asif Ghafoor, condemned “the brutal murder” of “a brave police officer”, and suspected the involvement of an entity “more than a terrorist organisation”.