Thursday, December 23, 2021
#Pakistan - December 16 — a day like no other before - 2014 Peshawar school massacre - 'We kept his pen' - 132 children lose their lives
For Shahana Ajoon, every December brings grief, anger and agony for her family which is still struggling to come to terms with the deadly terror attack on a school in the north-western Pakistani city of Peshawar, seven years ago.
Ajoon's torture is mirrored among the parents of the 132 school children who were killed in the massacre on December 16, 2014, perpetrated by the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) militants, in what remains one of the worst terror attacks in the history of Pakistan.
Last month Imran Khan's government signed a month-long ceasefire agreement with the TTP — a militant group which carried out several attacks on Pakistan's security forces and civilians in the past 15 years.
The group has not extended the ceasefire agreement and stated last week that Islamabad has not honored the truce and failed to release their 102 fighters imprisoned in the Pakistani jails.
There was no immediate comment from Pakistani government officials to a DW request.
Soon after the truce ended, the militant group attacked police officers providing security to the polio vaccination team in the northwestern Tank district. Their gunmen killed one police official and wounded another.
Their spokesperson Mohammad Khurasani, claimed responsibility for the attack in the statement.
December 16 — a day like no other before
Every year, this very day opens old wounds for Ajoon and her family, while thinking of the brutal massacre in their children's school. She still vividly remembers that foggy December morning. As the hours-long horror unfolded, this Tuesday would be a day like no other.
Ajoon and Ajoon Khan lost their son Asfand Khan, an eighth-grade student. They could not gather the courage to look at the bullet wounds on their son.
"It was unbearable for us to see the wounds, we heard he was shot in the head multiple times from a very close distance. Seven years have passed, and it seems it was yesterday," Ajoon told DW, with a shaking voice and tears in her eyes.
Pens, school bags and books
Parents and relatives mourning the death of their children are still reeling from that deadly massacre. They recall their children's conversations with them, their memories and looking at their belongings, including uniforms, pens, school bags and books.
Ajoon Khan told DW: "That day, I was informed by my cousin about the school under attack and everyone was searching for their children. I rushed to the school where ambulance sirens were blaring all around. I was asked to go to hospitals to search for my son, among the dead bodies."
"Hours passed, the sun had set, and it was dark, and I was still searching for my son inside the two main hospitals, Lady Reading hospital and Combined Military Hospital. Hopes of Khan's survival were raised when I could not find the body initially and I was praying all the time," he continued.
"Then I got the desperate message from my cousin, 'We have found Khan's body. He is no more.' I was shaken and broken, and I felt as if it was the end of the world."
Eight gunmen stormed inside the school and started firing indiscriminately with automatic weapons, entering the classrooms and main auditoriums, and setting off heavy explosives.
"I was told that my son's head was opened and later stitched… I could not look at him, it was unbearable for me. We lowered his wooden coffin with his uniform entirely soaked in blood and buried his motorbike keys along with him," Khan said. "The only thing we kept from his pocket was his pen."
'Short-lived' reconciliation process
Ajoon was speaking from her home in Peshawar, a sprawling gritty metropolis in the northwestern province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, bordering Afghanistan and where millions have been affected by the militant violence.
"We used to call Asfand 'Sonu' — his nickname — and he said my recognition is my real name. A week before the incident he said to me, 'Mama one day people will recognize me with my name Asfand' and I now realize he was right," Asfand's mother explained.
Since the Peshawar school attack, analysts believe the country's counterterrorism posture has significantly changed its trajectory to curb militancy through drastic measures and launching all over assaults against TTP in the past few years.
"Now any pardons given to TTP would have undermined those commitments, and the conducted peace talks will impact the overall counterterrorism narrative that the state claims to hold firm. The initiation of the reconciliation process with TTP was bound to be short-lived," Saman Rizwan, an Islamabad-based policy research analyst, told DW.
"Expecting the militant group to surrender its only legitimate tool of violence is an overstretch. The history of violence associated with TTP is enough to acknowledge the underlying motivations of the group," she said.
Still awaiting justice
The families of the children are still awaiting justice and their case has been pending in the Supreme Court.
Dost Muhammad, who lost his 14-year-old son Asad Aziz that December day, told DW: "I saw the news on the television and rushed to the school. Our case against the brutality is pending in the courts and our government is negotiating with them. They could not feel our pain and suffering."
"The tragedy was so terrifying that schools remained closed for nearly a month across the entire Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province. People were terrified and parents preferred to keep their children at home and even I was reluctant to send my children to the school," Muhammad recalled.
'He was a shining star - but he left us'
After the school attack, the most comprehensive military operation against the militant group was carried out, which significantly reduced their capacity to launch attacks in Pakistan.
"I miss my Asfand," said Ajoon. "Whenever I saw his cousins, class fellows and friends in the family functions. They are all grown-up men now. He was a shining star and brilliant student but he left us."
Pakistan and China: An unhappy union in Gwadar
Protests against Beijing’s strategic investments in Balochistan are only the latest in a long line of grievances.
A couple of months back, 70-year-old housewife Masi Zainab asked a charismatic local political leader, Maulana Hidayat-ur-Rehman Baloch, to help mount a protest for the rights of the citizens of Gwadar, a port city in southwestern Pakistan. Within weeks, Masi Zainab was marching with thousands of women on the streets of the city, a first for this conservative society. Responding to the call, Rehman launched a sit-in protest on 15 November.
The protest has gained global media attention because Gwadar represents both the starting point and centre stage of China’s Belt and Road projects in Pakistan, referred to locally as the China–Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC). In this city of just 90,000 inhabitants, China has funded the construction of a deep seaport, airport, power plant and highways. Joint promotion of the city’s projects by Pakistan and China touts Gwadar as the Dubai or Singapore of the future.
Meanwhile, “Aunty” Zainab prepares food for the protesters, some of whom camped at the entrance to the Chinese-funded and operated Gwadar port for a month, far from the bustling metropolises of Pakistan. The protests have shaken mainstream media discourse in the country and its leader, Rehman, has become one of the most popular opposition figures in Pakistan.
The protests were based on two primary grievances, each of which have implications beyond the tiny port city of Gwadar. The first is a reduction in fishing opportunities, particularly important for a district where 65 per cent of the population are fishermen. Thousands of deep-sea fishing vessels, including some owned by Chinese companies, are devastating the fish population in the waters off Gwadar. Deep-sea fishing vessels use long fish-catching nets, which also catch eggs and small fish, leaving little for locals.
China’s demand for seafood is seemingly insatiable. According to a study by Stockholm University, China will require up to 18 million tons of additional seafood to satisfy its expected domestic consumption by 2030. In July this year, five Chinese deep-sea vessels were intercepted near Gwadar on suspicion of illegal fishing. The trawlers, subsequently found to be loaded with fish, were taken into custody by the Pakistan Maritime Security Agency. This incursion further aggravated protesters, who are now demanding a complete end to deep-sea fishing in the 12 nautical-mile sea limit off Gwadar.
The second reason for the protests is the plethora of issues experienced by local residents due to the security arrangements of Chinese personnel working on BRI projects. Chinese workers in Gwadar have been under attack by Baloch insurgents who blame China for the exploitation of their resources. As a result, Gwadar has been heavily militarised. Local residents must pass through numerous checkpoints on a daily basis, where they have to prove their identity and at times are refused passage. Recently, locals have resorted to protest against the daily humiliation of justifying their movements and have demanded an end to the security controls.
Despite multiple public demonstrations, the Pakistan government has not fulfilled any of the protesters’ demands, which also include improvements to water supply, electricity and roads. Pakistan’s Prime Minister Imran Khan announced in a tweet that he has taken notice, but there has been no concrete follow-up action. Now protesters say they will block operations of Chinese-controlled Gwadar port and its allied expressways. They have also announced a long march to the capital Islamabad if demands are not met.
Indirectly, Chinese interests in Gwadar have become a target of protesters’ demands. Although the demonstrations are not explicitly anti-Chinese, the demands put forth are in direct opposition to Chinese goals. For instance, Pakistan’s Senate was advised in late November that China would receive 91 per cent of the revenue generated by Gwadar port. Gwadar protesters led by Rehman are now demanding that 98 per cent of the revenue be retained by Gwadar and that only 2 percent goes to China. China has spent billions of dollars in Pakistan with the anticipation of substantial revenue from Gwadar port in the future.
The Gwadar sit-in protest was temporarily called off last week when the government announced it would accept the demands of protestors. The movement’s leader has said that if the government fails to implement the promised changes, they will protest again with more intensity.
Therefore, a complete blockage of the port is anticipated in the next phase. This will not only bring an end to the already limited cargo movement taking place at Gwadar port, but will also damage its reputation. After such upheaval, it will be hard to convince foreign investors that Gwadar is a secure and reliable bet. As a strategic economic investment for China, Gwadar is in jeopardy.
https://www.lowyinstitute.org/the-interpreter/pakistan-and-china-unhappy-union-gwadar
#Pakistan - No ‘Merry Christmas’ on cakes, people ask Karachi bakeries: ‘Are Christians lesser Pakistanis?’
Enraged by the incident, some users online accused Delizia of forgetting what the white in the Pakistan flag stands for — minority religion.
The Christmas holiday spirit in Pakistan has been dampened after two bakeries in Karachi — Delizia and Auntie Munaver — were accused of discrimination by allegedly refusing to write “Merry Christmas” on customers’ cakes.
“Are Christians lesser Pakistanis that they cannot be served or are popular bakeries just for Muslims?” asked author Shamila Ghyas.
“Two well known bakeries refusing to write “Merry Christmas” on their cakes in Karachi, a huge majority defending the decision as well,” said Pakistani musician Daniel Panjwaneey.
On 21 December, a woman by the name of Celestia Naseem Khan took to Facebook to narrate how a worker at Delizia in Karachi’s Khayaban-e-Jami area refused to write ‘Merry Christmas’ on a cake as it was an “order (to not write the message) from the kitchen”. The woman further said: “If they’re so against the minorities and their religion then they should not even make money from these occasions.”
A day later, a woman accused staff at Auntie Munaver, located in Clifton’s Bokhari Commercial Area of Karachi, of refusing to write the seasonal message on a cake following “instructions from the management”. While Delizia told Dawn that the incident was an act of an individual and that it would be “taking action” against the staffer, Auntie Munaver is yet to respond to the allegations.
A starkly similar incident took place in 2018 at Delizia’s Badar Commercial branch after which the bakery reportedly dismissed some staff. Some social media users recalled the 2018 case asserting that they weren’t convinced the latest incident was the result of an individual’s act.
Meanwhile, others pledged to never order from Delizia bakery, encouraging others to boycott the chain.
Some users jokingly posted seasonal greetings, saying: “Merry Christmas Delizia and Auntie Munaver. May you lose (at least) some of your biases in 2022. (sic)”
This came as journalist Naila Inayat and others accused Interior Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed of “seasonal rhetoric” following his remarks that Christians are a “peace loving” community. “Pakistani Christians remain one of the most persecuted religious minority groups. Try to undo the discriminatory laws against them, instead of seasonal rhetoric,” said the journalist.
‘See the flag’
Enraged by the incident, some users accused Delizia of forgetting what the white in the Pakistan flag stands for. The Pakistani flag, which shows white star and a crescent on a dark green field, has the colour green to represent Islam, the dominant religion followed in the country, and white to represent minority religions in the country.
Meanwhile, Paris-based Pakistani journalist Taha Siddiqui said while cakes are a “luxury item”, one could only imagine what under-privileged non-Muslim minorities must face in the country.
Some online users defended Delizia by saying negative social media campaigns can hurt the jobs of employees at the bakery.
Responding to those defending Delizia and saying customers can simply write the message on the cake by themselves, one Facebook user wrote: “All the people here saying write it yourself, would you say the same if something like this happened abroad to a Muslim? We have to protect our minorities.”
https://theprint.in/go-to-pakistan/merry-christmas-cakes-karachi-bakeries-christians-pakistanis/786188/
Wednesday, December 22, 2021
#Pakistan - Rude shock for #PTI
RESULTS for the first phase of the local bodies’ elections in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa are out and the outcome in 46 out of the 64 tehsils declared so far has sent shock waves across the country’s political landscape.
The PTI that ruled KP for nearly eight and half years has ended up getting a bloody nose from no less a rival than the JUI-F whose leadership was the butt of jokes and snide remarks by the ruling party. The religious party, which received a body blow at the hands of the PTI in the last two elections, much like many other political parties including the ANP, has made a surprise comeback bagging the chairmanship and mayorship in 16 sub-districts, with the PTI trailing with just 12 slots.
In fact, together the opposition parties — ANP, PML-N, Jamaat-i-Islami, PPP-P — clinched 31 seats. Add the seven independents, and the figure jumps to 38. This is a huge number and should be cause for serious concern for the PTI which until very recently could rightly boast of being the only party that was twice returned to power in the north-western province.
Not only this, the PTI also lost in areas and cities where it had single-handedly defeated all the major political parties. For instance, in Peshawar, the citadel of political power, where the PTI had won five national and 11 provincial assembly seats in the last general elections, the ruling party has ended up with just one tehsil. Many prominent figures in the current government, both federal as well as provincial, have lost their native tehsils.
Surely, the PTI will do some deep soul-searching in the weeks ahead, but it cannot deny the impact of its poor economic policies, the price hike and the power and gas outages that have hit the common man hard — something that many in government have acknowledged. This is probably the major factor responsible for the PTI defeat in the first round of the local bodies polls.
Nepotism and favouritism in the award of party tickets at the expense of diehard workers, lack of an organisational structure at the lower tier and a complacent leadership are some of the other factors contributing to the PTI’s shock defeat in the hotly contested elections. The myth that the PTI is invincible has been broken and this should give some food for thought to the party leadership.
Like the PTI, the ANP too needs to look inward and probe its rather poor performance. The Pakhtun national party has been able to win only one seat from Peshawar and has lost all three seats in its birthplace and stronghold of Charsadda. With just six seats in hand, it hardly has any reason to rejoice. It needs to understand that it will have to reshape its narrative in order to enlist the support of an educated and social media-savvy youth in KP.
https://www.dawn.com/news/1665125/rude-shock-for-pti
The Evolution and Future of Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan
The Taliban’s return to power in Afghanistan has shifted the balance of power between the Pakistani government and the largest antistate militant group in the country.
Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) is the largest militant organization fighting against the state in Pakistan. According to the UN, the TTP also boasts several thousand fighters in Afghanistan, with strongholds on both sides of the Afghanistan-Pakistan border.
Although Pakistani military actions, U.S. drone warfare, and factional infighting led to the TTP’s decline from 2014 to 2018, the militant group has been experiencing a strong resurgence since the Afghan Taliban and U.S. government signed a peace deal in February 2020. In fact, since July 2020, ten militant groups opposed to the Pakistani state have merged with the TTP, including, among others, three Pakistani affiliates of al-Qaeda and four major factions that had separated from the TTP in 2014. Following these mergers, TTP violence has become more frequent, and this violent streak continues to accelerate as a result of the Afghan Taliban’s takeover in Kabul in August 2021.
The TTP serves as a crucial case study due to its deep historical roots with the Afghan Taliban, al-Qaeda, and the Islamic State in Khorasan Province (ISKP). The group is a by-product of al-Qaeda’s jihadi politics in Afghanistan and Pakistan after 9/11. The TTP still has covert links with al-Qaeda and has declared that it looks to Afghan Taliban leaders as its own while enjoying safe haven under Taliban rule in Afghanistan. And although the ISKP was born largely from disaffected TTP members, it has always avoided any physical confrontation with the group. Moreover, ISKP public messages continue to reveal a soft spot for TTP fighters. This connection will be particularly important to monitor, as any alliance between the two groups could have severe security implications beyond the region. According to a U.S. intelligence assessment, the ISKP could be capable of mounting an attack in the West, including in the United States, in the near future. Any alliance between the TTP and the ISKP could strengthen the ISKP and worsen the threat it poses beyond the region.
To understand how much of a threat the TTP could pose, it is useful to examine the rise and evolution of the group—its background, the policies and strategies that helped the group achieve legitimacy among jihadists since its establishment in 2007, and its changing efforts to eliminate past liabilities and make its anti-state militant campaign more mainstream in Pakistan. This information provides valuable context for assessing the significance of the TTP’s intensified violence and organizational strength after the Afghan Taliban’s return to power and, more importantly, for gauging its future threat to security and the likelihood of a peace deal with the Pakistani state.
THE TTP’S ORIGINS
The TTP is a by-product of the intra-jihadi politics that followed the 2001 U.S. invasion of Afghanistan. The TTP claims that its armed struggle aims to establish an Islamic political system in Pakistan based on the group’s interpretation of sharia, a task it says was the main goal for establishing Pakistan in 1947. At the time of the U.S. invasion, many Pakistani jihadists who had fought on behalf of the Pakistani government in Afghanistan and in Indian Kashmir turned against the Pakistani state for its support of the United States’ so-called global war on terror, among other grievances. TTP members thus began sheltering the Afghan Taliban, al-Qaeda, and other militant allies who were fleeing the Afghanistan conflict. Yielding to U.S. pressure, the Pakistani government eventually cracked down on the safe havens, but its violent response ultimately prompted these Pakistani jihadists to band together and more formally ally with al-Qaeda and the Afghan Taliban. This eventually led to the establishment of the TTP in 2007.
At its inception, the TTP claimed to be an extension of the Afghan Taliban. It declared that the then leader of the Taliban, Mullah Mohammed Omar, was its spiritual leader and offered to support the Afghan Taliban’s war against the United States and its allies. Though the TTP framed its militant campaign as a defensive war against Pakistan’s military operations, the group hoped to follow in the Afghan Taliban’s footsteps and establish a sharia system in Pakistan, freeing the country from the “American stooges” who supposedly governed it.
However, over time, the TTP’s focus and strategy changed. For instance, in 2020 the TTP claimed that it no longer had any regional or global agenda beyond Pakistan. This pronouncement may have reflected an attempt to reduce international support for Pakistan’s battle against the TTP; at times, Pakistan was able to secure sophisticated U.S. drone technology to fight the TTP due to the group’s open collaboration with al-Qaeda. In 2018, the TTP formally excluded from its manifesto calls for a “greater jihad” in Afghanistan and for supporting the global jihadi agenda of al-Qaeda—calls that were prevalent in its early narratives.
The group also made another tactical change in its 2018 manifesto: it deprioritized indiscriminate attacks on Pakistani targets, including against civilians. For years, these attacks had aimed to pressure the Pakistani government to meet TTP demands. But the TTP’s manifesto redirected its fighters away from attacking civilians and religious minorities, advocating instead targeted violence against Pakistani military personnel and intelligence operatives. Since this redirection, there has been a sharp decline in TTP attacks against civilians. While it is difficult to say what caused the change in tactics, one reason could be that the TTP’s early spate of violence against civilians earned the ire of global and local jihadi allies, including Osama bin Laden. Another reason could be that the TTP wanted to focus its war on the Pakistani state and security forces.
Finally, to help establish its legitimacy, the TTP had to align some of its objectives with the political goals of certain Pakistani religio-political and ethnic parties, particularly a subset of Baluch and Pashtun nationalists. In recent decades, these ethnic minorities have protested allegedly discriminative and exploitative state policies. They are located in the Pakistan tribal belt bordering Afghanistan, which serves as the TTP’s support base.
HOW IT HAS EVOLVED
The TTP has evolved over the years to maintain its influence among jihadi networks in Pakistan.
ESTABLISHING LEGITIMACY
The TTP faced two challenges from the outset. First, it had to lay the foundation of the anti-state jihadi war front in Pakistan. The Pakistani military establishment’s strong ties with indigenous jihadi groups complicated this objective. These groups were actively involved in the jihad in Kashmir and Afghanistan and enjoyed the state’s support. Thus, the TTP had to turn this long-standing jihadi friendship with the state into an open jihadi war against the state. Second, it needed to gain prominence in Pakistan’s highly competitive jihadi and religio-political ecosystem, in which many advocated nonmilitant means to achieve the same goals that the TTP was fighting for. These religio-political parties have been working for decades to accomplish the fundamental goal of creating a Pakistani state that upholds their interpretation of sharia.
To work around these challenges, TTP leaders pursued four political objectives. First, the group’s leadership strengthened its alliances with the Afghan Taliban and al-Qaeda to increase its local and international legitimacy. Pakistani Pashtun tribesmen as well as Deobandi and Salafist seminaries, Islamist parties, and other jihadi groups all supported the Afghan Taliban’s insurgency against the United States and its allies, seeing the campaign as a legitimate jihad to expel foreign infidels. Thus, as the TTP supported the Afghan jihad by offering material provisions, the group’s legitimacy was enhanced. This strategy helped the TTP recruit a large number of young recruits for its war against the Pakistani state. The TTP provided the Afghan Taliban with bases in the Pashtun tribal regions bordering Afghanistan, eventually earning an official endorsement from its Afghan ally. Its closeness to the Afghan Taliban and al-Qaeda—as well as Pakistani jihadists’ frustrations with pro-state militant groups who were seen as compromising their narratives after 9/11—granted the TTP space in the competitive jihadi ecosystem, elevating it above other groups like Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Mohammed.
Similarly, the TTP garnered al-Qaeda’s support by providing it shelter in Pakistan. It also launched attacks either with, or on behalf of, al-Qaeda. For instance, a prominent TTP leader eventually claimed that the group assassinated former Pakistani prime minister Benazir Bhutto within weeks of the group’s formal launch; she had been considered one of al-Qaeda’s top enemies since the early 1990s. In addition, the TTP organized attacks to appeal to the global jihadi agenda of al-Qaeda. For example, the TTP attempted to bomb New York City in 2010, a plot that was ultimately foiled. A year earlier, it had played a lead role in the suicide attack on a U.S. Central Intelligence Agency compound in Afghanistan’s southeastern Khost Province—another attack aimed at pleasing its ally. These acts further increased the TTP’s local and international legitimacy and its competitiveness with more established jihadi groups in the region.
Second, the TTP killed hundreds of tribal elders who opposed its militancy in the tribal belt. The former Pakistani Pashtun tribal belt—comprised of the semiautonomous Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA)—was governed by a tribal system. However, the government had partial control of the FATA and needed the tribal elders’ support to govern the territories and their people. Thus, in attacking the elders, the TTP essentially superseded and replaced the traditional tribal chieftains’ system with its militancy, thereby increasing its hold in these areas.
Third, the TTP poached members from highly skilled cadres of anti-Shia sectarian militant groups in Pakistan, such as Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ). Horrific attacks that the TTP carried out against the Shia sect in Pakistan encouraged LeJ members to defect, given the latter’s exclusive targeting of the Shia sect. As the TTP leveraged the capabilities of anti-Shia groups, this eventually helped to intensify the TTP’s war against the Pakistani state.
Fourth, the TTP established a sharia system in northwestern Pakistan in the same style that the Afghan Taliban imposed in Afghanistan before 9/11. This strategy attracted members of Pakistani Islamist groups from the districts of Malakand, Bajaur, and Orakzai, among others, thereby expanding the TTP’s political base. The TTP was also able to attract educated Islamists from Pakistan’s urban areas; many of these people were frustrated about the failed political approaches to sharia implementation in the country. The TTP’s efforts helped it win over numerous Islamists who had long been aiming to achieve the Islamization of Pakistan through nonmilitant, religious-political means.
TRANSFORMING INTO AN ANTI-STATE MILITANT MOVEMENT
Over time, the TTP evolved into a focused anti-state militant movement in Pakistan. Three factors contributed to this change: al-Qaeda’s decreasing influence, the Afghan Taliban’s rising influence, and the TTP’s expanding efforts to remain relevant in contemporary Pakistani politics.
Initially, al-Qaeda had a profound influence on the TTP’s politics. For example, it compelled TTP leaders to revisit their anti-Shia agenda and largely limit the war to Western interests and the Pakistani state; in 2010, bin Laden asked the TTP to stop attacks against the Shias and the Barelvi subsect of the Hanafi school of Sunni Islam in Pakistan. But after U.S. drone strikes killed TTP leaders Baitullah Mehsud and Hakimullah Mehsud, the group was forced to reconsider its public support for al-Qaeda. Although al-Qaeda played an instrumental role in the TTP’s birth, rise, and expansion, the group determined that a close public relationship with al-Qaeda had become a liability. According to recent reports, however, al-Qaeda still plays an important role in mentoring the TTP behind the scenes.
Meanwhile, the Afghan Taliban’s influence has grown stronger. With some members co-located with the TTP in the tribal area of Waziristan in Pakistan, the Afghan Taliban became a natural political and organizational model for the TTP. As the Afghan Taliban refined its strategy, the TTP followed suit. In 2014, TTP leaders Omar Khalid Khorasani and Qari Shakeel Ahmad wanted to replace the quasi-tribal structure of TTP management with the Afghan Taliban’s centralized bureaucratic system, arguing that such a structure was best suited for expansion. The TTP finally adopted this change in 2020, appointing shadow governors for different regions of Pakistan and announcing the group’s first-ever centralized military training system. That same year, TTP chief Mufti Noor Wali Mehsud announced that the TTP can only be victorious in Pakistan if it follows in the footsteps of the Afghan Taliban.
The TTP has also engaged more with mainstream political issues to remain relevant in Pakistan’s political discourse. For example, the TTP has called on Pakistan’s opposition political parties to reconsider their nonviolent approach if they truly seek to end the powerful military establishment’s political meddling. In this vein, the TTP has endorsed the politics of Pashtun and Baluch nationalists in Pakistan despite harboring deep ideological differences with both groups. (Baluch nationalists, for instance, are largely secular in disposition.) TTP leaders have even issued statements in support of the Pashtun rights movement, known as the Pashtun Tahafuz Movement, despite its anti-Taliban positions. The TTP has also recently endorsed the massive countrywide protests of Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan (TLP), a far-right religio-political party fighting against so-called enemies of Islam. This is particularly significant because the TLP belongs to the Sunni Barelvi sect, while the TTP originates from the rival Deobandi sect. Each of these endorsements demonstrates the TTP’s efforts to remain relevant in contemporary discourse.
THE TTP AFTER THE AFGHAN TALIBAN’S TAKEOVER
Prior to the collapse of former Afghan president Ashraf Ghani’s government, the Pakistani government repeatedly accused it of harboring anti-Pakistan militant groups in Afghanistan. As a result, some in Islamabad believed that if the Afghan Taliban (a so-called Pakistan-friendly organization) were to return to power in Kabul, the latter would limit these groups’ freedom of action. Contrary to these expectations, however, the Afghan Taliban’s return has so far strengthened the TTP.
Following its takeover, the Afghan Taliban released hundreds of TTP prisoners from prisons in Kabul, including TTP senior leaders like founding deputy emir Maulvi Faqir Mohammad. The TTP celebrated its members’ releases with large motor rallies and caravans in eastern Afghanistan. Videos released since the Taliban’s takeover also show the TTP enjoying complete operational freedom in Afghanistan. In addition to congratulating the Afghan Taliban on its return to power, the TTP publicly renewed its pledge of allegiance to its ally. Reinforcing its ongoing narratives, the TTP’s leadership presented the Afghan Taliban as a role model to the group’s fighters, arguing that perseverance in the war against the Pakistani state will guarantee a similar victory to what the Taliban achieved in Afghanistan. In addition, the TTP claimed responsibility for a large number of attacks in the months following the Afghan government’s collapse—generating the highest monthly average attack rate in the last five to six years.
When the Afghan Taliban’s spokesman was asked about the future of the TTP in Afghanistan, he was noncommittal and evasive. He argued that the TTP is a Pakistani issue and that his group has nothing to do with it. The spokesman even suggested that Pakistan should try to resolve its problems with the TTP through negotiations.
CONCLUSION
With the Afghan Taliban back in power in Kabul, Pakistan’s prime minister, president, and foreign minister offered negotiations and general amnesty to the TTP. Initially, the TTP rejected these offers, arguing that it considers the Pakistani constitution “un-Islamic.” Yet the group left the door to dialogue open, stating that the TTP is ready for “any serious negotiations which can ensure its sharia implementation goal in Pakistan.” And in early November, spokespeople of the Pakistani government and the TTP announced that they were negotiating under a short-term ceasefire and would be extending it to enable further dialogue.
Hopes for the negotiations are higher this time around because two major factors that led to past failures no longer exist: first, the former Afghan government and U.S. forces no longer control Afghanistan, and second, hardliners within the TTP no longer oppose dialogue. A TTP peace deal with the Pakistani state represented a direct threat to the former Afghan government and U.S. forces, ultimately resulting in TTP contributions to the Taliban attacks in Afghanistan. Thus, they always objected to such a deal in the past. With the removal of this first factor, TTP hardliners now support negotiations. For example, TTP co-founder and senior commander Khorasani completely supports negotiations this time, unlike in 2014 when he sabotaged both sides’ dialogues.
Ultimately, a political settlement remains the only option for the Pakistani government. It will not be able to pressure the Afghan Taliban to combat the TTP beyond a certain point for two reasons. First, the TTP played an instrumental role in the post-9/11 resurgence of the Taliban. The TTP’s leadership has strong bonds with various Afghan Taliban commanders and groups, who deeply admired the TTP’s sacrifices in fighting against U.S. forces and U.S. allies in Afghanistan. This pro-TTP lobby within the Taliban is influential and crosses tribal and regional cleavages. As a result, using force against the TTP would result in serious intra-Taliban rifts. Second, the Afghan Taliban faces a major challenge in countering its rival, the ISKP, which (as noted earlier) includes former influential TTP commanders and hundreds of their fighters.
The TTP also now believes that a settlement is in its best interests, in part because of its ties with the Afghan Taliban once again in power in Kabul. The TTP claims that it agreed to negotiations with the Pakistani state to decrease the political problems of the Taliban. It is aware of the Afghan Taliban’s problems with the international community and that the threat of foreign fighters in Afghanistan would exacerbate them. The Taliban has promised the United States and wider international community that it will not let any individual or group pose a threat to any state outside Afghanistan. The TTP comprises two-third of these fighters. Thus, if these fighters continue to mount attacks in Pakistan, the Afghan Taliban’s promises will be considered nullified, further increasing the international community’s political mistrust.
All this said, the TTP’s main concern remains the implementation of sharia in Pakistan based on its strict interpretation of Islam. The group says that it will not lay down its arms until this goal is achieved. Thus, the likelihood of a quick peace deal between the state and the TTP remains low; Pakistan cannot afford any political settlement that comes at the cost of replacing a democratic system with strict sharia rules. Yet, because a settlement remains the only option for both sides due to geopolitical realities, there is hope that both parties will compromise to some extent to create a pathway forward.
Abdul Sayed is a researcher on jihadism and a specialist on the politics and security of Afghanistan and Pakistan. Sayed has a master’s degree in political science from Lund University in Sweden. He is currently working on projects related to violent extremist organizations and transnational jihadism in Afghanistan and Pakistan. His Twitter handle is @abdsayedd.
https://carnegieendowment.org/2021/12/21/evolution-and-future-of-tehrik-e-taliban-pakistan-pub-86051