Pakistani Taliban deny offering protection to PTI peace march

A statement issued by the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) Friday denied all news reports of the militant organisation offering protection to the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) South Waziristan rally and called the rally an attempt by Imran Khan to “increase his political height”. Spokesperson Ahsanullah Ahsan said in the statement that TTP was a theoretical organization based on the fundamentals of Islam which practices all its matters in the light of Islamic orders. “As Imran Khan is a liberal, secular person and so is his party, we deny all baseless news stating that we have offered to provide him security for his so-called peace rally,” said Ahsan. The statement further said that the “mujahideen” were not so worthless that they would be deployed “to protect a westernised and secular personality”. “Imran Khan’s so called peace march is not in sympathy of drone-hit Muslims; instead it is a try by him to increase his political height,” said the TTP spokesperson, adding that they, therefore, did not need any sympathy from him. The statement also said that they would not reveal their plans against anyone as that would be against “military tactics”. Ahsan further said that TTP has divided Pakistani politicians into two categories, both of which were “slaves of the West”. “One are those who remained in power after coming into the being of TTP; they have cleared their enmity to Islam and Mujahideen by their actions like PPP, MQM & ANP etc,” said the statement, adding: “The others are those who have not yet gotten a chance to be in power like PML-N, and PTI etc; who are secular and slaves too, but we have put a scale of enmity against them conditional to their coming into power.”