Pakistan will not initiate a dialogue with the local Taliban unless they lay down their arms and give up terrorism, Interior Minister Rehman Malik said on Friday amid reports of secret negotiations between the government and militant groups.
A top Taliban militant leader has been sacked as the deputy commander of the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, amid speculation of a deepening rift in the terror group over the peace talks with the government.
The Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan has urged the Mehsud tribesmen of South Waziristan to leave their homes, claiming that the Taliban is in a state of war with the government of Pakistan.
Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan chief Hakimullah Mehsud has warned that his fighters were planning orchestrated attacks against the government and the military to wrest control of areas that they had lost in the country's northwest.
The offer of peace talks came at a time when the Pakistani military operations in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas on the Pak-Afghan border had had little impact on the operational capabilities of the Tehrik-e-Taliban. Amir Mir reports.
A suicide bomber targeted a police van in northwest Pakistan on Friday, killing two policemen, including an officer, and injuring several others. The attacker struck the vehicle of Station House Officer Syed Ajmer Shah at Nowshera in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province. Shah and his driver were killed in the attack, police officials told the media. Shah had received threats from the banned Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, the officials said.
Pakistan would want to take full advantage of the situation to direct Taliban trained terrorists into the Kashmir Valley, alert Lieutenant General Ashok Joshi (retd) and Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
A journalist working for Voice of America Pashtu radio was shot dead by gunmen claiming to be belonging to Tehrik Taliban Pakistan in Mohmand Agency on Tuesday.
Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Monday cancelled his upcoming visit to the United States where he was scheduled to attend the Nuclear Security Summit.
Pakistani news website thenews.com.pk reported that a clash broke out between the groups led by Hakimullah Mehsud and Wali-ur-Rehman. The meeting was convened to appoint a sucessor to slain Taliban commander Beitullah Mehsud.
The Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan has said it will continue carrying out suicide attacks and targetting Pakistani security forces despite joining other militant groups in a pledge not to kill innocent people or to resort to kidnappings for ransom.
Pakistan's border region remains the most dangerous place in the world and the Federally Administered Tribal Areas remains the epicentre of the world's worst of global jihad, a top Pentagon official has said.
Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan on Saturday claimed responsibility for kidnapping a group of over 30 boys, who had strayed into Afghanistan's eastern Kunar province as reports said some of them had escaped and reached back to their homes.
'It is a testing time for our foreign policy which may involve a certain element of taking risks, assessing costs, and expecting failures,' asserts Commodore Venugopal Menon (retd).
The decision to target the Pakistani Taliban comes at a time when the UN is seeking to encourage the Afghan Taliban to pursue peace talks with the government there, a prelude to a US withdrawal from the war-ravaged country.
A Pakistani military helicopter carrying 11 foreigners crashed in the Pakistan occupied Kashmir on Friday, killing ambassadors of the Philippines and Norway and at least five others as the Taliban claimed responsibility for the downing of the chopper and said Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif was the target.
The case of Shahbaz Bhatti clearly shows that the terrorists were guided by someone from within the forces, as the killers not only knew that the minister had no security at the time they planned to attack him but they also succeeded in leaving the place undisturbed.
A top leader of the banned Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan has said that his group will seek mediation by countries like Saudi Arabia if the government offers to hold peace talks.
Harkatul Jihad al-Islami chief Ilyas Kashmiri, who was killed in a United States drone attack in Pakistan's South Waziristan region, had reportedly convened a meeting in North Waziristan last month to constitute a special squad that would be tasked with avenging the death of Al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden.
The Taliban has vowed to launch more "high-profile" attacks against government and military installations in Pakistan.
Al Qaeda and a North Waziristan-based terror group 'Brigade 313' have reportedly prepared a plan to launch an attack on the 19th Commonwealth Games, which are due to be held in New Delhi from October 3 to October 14.
The Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan has claimed responsibility for two suicide bombings targeting Shia processions in Karachi and Lahore that claimed 16 lives on Tuesday.Taliban spokesman Azam Tariq told reporters in the lawless North Waziristan tribal region on Wednesday that the two attacks on Tuesday were aimed against security personnel because "they serve the United States's interests".
An anti-terrorism court on Friday handed down '23 times' death sentence to three militants of outlawed Pakistani Taliban for the 2009 attack on the country's spy agency Inter-Services Intelligence's headquarters here that killed 35 people.
Blaming Pakistan's Inter Services Intelligence for the killing of Osama bin Ladin, the Tehrike Taliban Pakistan has vowed to avenge the death the Al Qaeda chief. Both the United States and Pakistan are enemies, but Taliban's prime target is Pakistan, as without its help the West could not operate in Abbottabad.
Seeking to wriggle out of the FATF's grey list, Pakistan has imposed tough financial sanctions on 88 banned terror groups and their leaders, including Hafiz Saeed, Masood Azhar and Dawood Ibrahim, by ordering the seizure of all of their properties and freezing of bank accounts, a media report said.
The US State Department, in its Congressional mandated annual Country Reports on Terrorism for the year 2018, on Friday said even though the Pakistani government voiced support for political reconciliation between the Afghan government and the Taliban, it did not restrict the terror group and the Haqqani Network from operating in Pakistan-based safe havens and threatening the US and Afghan forces in Afghanistan.
Fidayeen Islam, the suicide bomber squad of Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, has claimed that more than 300 fidayeen (suicide bombers) have been sent to various parts of Pakistan to target the Shia and Bralvi religious centres.
The Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan has claimed responsibility for the suicide attack at Mardan military training center in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa on Tuesday.
The banned Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan has condemned the release of Central Intelligence Agency contractor Raymond Davis under a "blood money" deal with relatives of two men he killed and threatened to target all those who aided the US in securing his acquittal in court.
Terming United States President Barack Obama's ongoing visit of India as a plan by the US and India to ruin Pakistan, Tehrike Taliban Pakistan has asked the people of Pakistan to support it the for sake of the country's survival.
Three Taliban militants have been given a death sentence by a Pakistani court for attacking trucks carrying critical supplies for NATO troops in Afghanistan in 2010.
Over a year after US and Pakistani authorities claimed to have killed Mehsud in a drone strike in North Waziristan, the Pakistan Taliban chief made an appearance in a video footage showing the killing of former Inter-Services Intelligence officer Colonel Sultan Ameer Tarar, commonly known as Colonel Imam on Saturday.
The arrest of four militants, including two young suicide bombers, in Karachi has once again highlighted the dangerous trend of how the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan is using local maulvis and handlers to poison the mind of innocent youngsters and send them to the tribal Waziristan mountainous region to become suicide bombers.
The Taliban on Monday warned the Pakistan government not to release American national Raymond Davis, who allegedly shot dead two men in Lahore in January, saying any official involved in a move to free him would be killed by militants. "Any Pakistani government official playing any role in Davis' release will be killed by the Taliban," said Azam Tariq, spokesman for the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan. The Taliban have also demanded that Davis should be executed by the authorities.
The Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan has claimed responsibility for the suicide attack on an elite Pakistani army training centre at Mardan in the country's northwest region.The suicide bomber unleashed his lethal payload in the midst of a parade, killing 27 soldiers and wounding 40 others. TTP spokesperson Ihsanullah Ihsan said, "We proudly claim responsibility for the Mardan attack; we sent the Fidayeen (suicide bomber) and he successfully carried out the attack."
The Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan has taken responsibility for the attack on NATO supply trucks in Sindh, which claimed 5 lives on Friday. The TTP has warned that such attacks will continue till Pakistan blocks the supply line to Afghanistan for NATO trucks.On Friday, nearly 12 Taliban militants blocked a road at Shikarpur Sindh and stooped the NATO tankers. After chasing away the drivers, they set nearly 35 tankers on fire. Some of the tankers were destroyed completely.
Pakistan's Punjab province' home department has directed concerned agencies to provide extra security cover to the banned Jamaat-ud-Daawa chief Hafeez Muhammed Saeed, following intelligence reports that the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan is planning to target him.
The Pakistan Taliban is rapidly making inroads into the Punjab province despite contradictory claims by the Shahbaz Sharif government.
A key Taliban commander has been arrested in connection with the violence in this Pakistani port city that has been hit by gang warfare since the last two years.
'India is our jageer,' Taliban spokesperson Azam Tariq said, 'and we will attack to take possession of it. We are training lots of fighters and suicide bombers who will be used for this purpose.'
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