Pakistan: The shadow of the Taliban

At least five people died and 31 were injured in a blast at a cinema hall in Peshawar on Sunday. It is not the first attack on a cinema hall and certainly not this one as it was attacked last year too. The cinema management had been warned by the police of terrorist activities many times. Two hand grenades were thrown into the audience in the midst of the film. The sound of the explosion created panic and people started running to save their lives. Such places are usually easy to target and create panic. The Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan’s (TTP) Jundallah faction has claimed responsibility for the attack, with a warning of more attacks in future. “We are requesting our Muslim brothers to refrain from visiting such places,” militant commander Ahmed Marwat told the Pakistani media. “If they don’t, they should be ready to face more attacks.” The blast occurred on the heels of the government’s initiative to start peace talks with the militants. It is such attacks that pose real problems for the government and its much sought after peace process. The minimum condition to start the peace talks was a ceasefire by the Taliban. With this attack, that condition has been violated much before the start of the talks. Though the TTP has distanced itself from the attack, their shadow over the incident cannot be denied. This is a replay of the All Saints Church attack in Peshawar last year and the attack on foreign mountaineers in Gilgit-Baltistan. This very group, Jundallah, claimed responsibility for both those attacks. That was also a time when the government and its emissaries were busy cajoling the TTP into peace talks. This is where the rub lies. Even if the TTP is not directly involved in attacks, the probability of its involvement through its various groups, 40 in number, cannot be denied because of its inherently loose organizational structure. Such anticipations are not conspiratorial; they are in fact the real concern even if the much talked about talks succeed. Such groups could even play the role of spoilers, to sabotage the peace process being followed up. Therefore there is very little margin for becoming complacent about the fact that the militants have agreed to come to the negotiation table.

The country is faced with a very tough and wily enemy. The spread of terrorism is not always visible to the naked eye. It is much deeper and as we have said so many times in this space, sleeper cells could stir up commotion anytime. Therefore peace talks aside, it is only good intelligence work that can save the country from becoming a worse killing field in the future