Karachi: Ethnic Sindhi nationalists Tuesday observed strike in several cities and towns of southern Sindh province against the arrival of internally displaced people (IDPs) from North Waziristan, who the nationalists believe, could transform the demography of their province.

The Sindh Bachao (Protect) Committee (SBC), comprising several Sindhi nationalist parties had called the strike to prevent entry of the IDPs, from North Waziristan, as estimated one million people were uproot from the war-torn area where Pakistan Army is striking on the militants with full blow.

The shutters remained down in Larkana whereas the activists staged a sit-in at the Indus Highway disrupting the traffic entailing long queues of the trucks and public transportation.

Shops also remained closed in Nawab Shah, Naushero Feroz, Moro, Kandiaro, Tharo Shah, Bhiria, Padidan, and Mehrabpur, which are located along the National Highway that connects this southern province with the northern part of the country.

The protests were also observed in Dadu, Tando Mohammad Khan and other towns.

Earlier, the SBC had written letters to the prime minister of Pakistan, provincial legislators and the country director of United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) pointing them out the alarming influx of the refugees into the Sindh province.

The SBC feared that the recent arrivals of migrants from North Waziristan might deprive the local people of their jobs, lands and other resources.

Provincial chief minister Qaim Ali Shah, however, shrugged off the nationalists’ apprehensions saying they were making the issue out of a ‘non-issue.’ At a dinner overnight, Shah said that about 3000 IDPS had arrived in the province and the government was allowing only those people who were holding national identity cards.

The chief minister said that he himself took up the issue of the IDPs before the nationalists did that as he realized that the IDPs who came during the 2009 operation in Swat were jeopardizing the law and order situation in Karachi.

Hundreds of thousand IDPs had come to Karachi, when the Pakistan Army launched an operation against the Taliban, who had captured the Swat valley, not very far from the capital city of Islamabad.

He said that the IDPs from Swat were told to go back after the operation was over but they did not go back and some of them were posing serious threats to the law and order in Karachi.

At least five people including two police officials were gunned down on Tuesday in the ongoing targeted killings in the city. Killings of police were on the rise ever since the military operation was launched in the North Waziristan.