Tag Archives: TTP

News, Politics, Government

Taliban accuses Malala of smear campaign

Leave a comment

A senior Pakistani Taliban commander has written to Malala Yousafzai, the teenage education activist shot by militants, accusing her of “smearing” them and of promoting “satanic” values, while urging her to return home.

Gunmen from the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) shot Malala, now 16, in the head in her home town in Swat last October after she had campaigned for the right of girls to go to school.

She made a powerful speech to the U N on Friday in her first public appearance since the near-fatal attack, vowing to continue her struggle for education and not be silenced by the militants.

In an open letter released Wednesday, Adnan Rasheed, a former air force member turned TTP cadre, said he personally wished the attack had not happened, but accused her of running a “smearing campaign” against the militants.

“When you were attacked it was shocking for me,” Rasheed wrote in English.

“I wished it would never happened (sic) and I had advised you before.”

But he added: “Taliban believe that you were intentionally writing against them and running a smearing campaign to malign their efforts to establish Islamic system in Swat and your writings were provocative.

“… It is amazing that you are shouting for education, you and the UNO (UN) is pretending that you were shot due to education, although this is not the reason… not the education but your propaganda was the issue,” he continued.

“What you are doing now, you are using your tongue on the behest of the others.”

The letter was sent to reporters in northwest Pakistan and its authenticity confirmed to AFP by a senior Taliban cadre who is a close associate of Rasheed. It is understood Malala has not received the letter herself.

Rasheed accused Malala of seeking to promote an education system begun by British colonialists to produce “Asians in blood but English in taste”, and said students should study Islam and not the “satanic or secular curriculum”.

“I advise you to come back home, adopt the Islamic and Pashtun culture, join any female Islamic madrassa near your home town, study and learn the book of Allah, use your pen for Islam and plight of Muslim ummah (community),” Rasheed wrote.

Malala was given life-saving treatment in Britain, where she now lives with her family.

Rasheed was sentenced to death over a 2003 attack on Pakistan’s then military ruler Pervez Musharraf, but escaped from custody in a mass jailbreak in April last year.

He said he had originally wanted to write to Malala to warn her against criticising the Taliban when she rose to prominence with a blog for the BBC Urdu service chronicling life under the militants’ 2007-9 rule in Swat, in northwest Pakistan.

The Taliban have destroyed hundreds of schools across the northwest, an area on the frontline of the country’s bloody struggle against Islamist militants.

But Rasheed said the attacks were necessary because government forces used schools as hideouts and bases.

Gordon Brown, the former British prime minister turned UN special envoy for global education, who has supported Malala since she was shot, issued a caustic response to …read more

Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox World News

News, Politics, Government

Pakistan Taliban say no shift to Syria

Leave a comment

Pakistani Taliban commanders Tuesday rejected suggestions they were sending fighters to Syria, saying some have gone there independently but the movement’s focus remained in Pakistan.

They said some militants, mainly Arabs and Central Asians, had gone to fight the forces of President Bashar al-Assad, but a senior Taliban leader dismissed reports of them setting up camps in Syria.

The lawless tribal areas of northwest Pakistan along the Afghan border have long been a magnet for militants from across the Muslim world eager to fight US-led NATO forces in Afghanistan.

But since the uprising against Assad began in March 2011, foreign jihadists have flocked to Syria, where disparate rebel groups are seeking his downfall.

Some media reports in recent days have claimed scores or even hundreds of Pakistani Taliban are among them and that they have set up camps in Syria.

A senior commander who sits on the shura or ruling council of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) told AFP there was no tactical shift and no decision had been made to send forces to Syria.

“There is no reality in these reports, we have far better targets in the region, NATO troops headed by the Americans are present in Afghanistan,” he said on condition of anonymity.

“We are already in a war with Pakistani troops. We support the mujahideen’s struggle in Syria but in our opinion, we have a lot more to do here in Pakistan and Afghanistan.”

The TTP is an umbrella group for numerous factions trying to bring down the Pakistani state and impose sharia law. It has ties to the Afghan Taliban and Al-Qaeda.

“The great evil (America) is here in Afghanistan, troops from 30 kafir (non-believer) countries are attacking innocent people in Afghanistan, so Bashar al-Assad is not that important for us,” the TTP commander said.

“Obama is the big evil, Americans are a much bigger evil for us. The Taliban shura has never discussed sending mujahideen to Syria.”

Another mid-ranking TTP commander in Miranshah, the main town of North Waziristan tribal district which is a hotbed of Taliban and Al-Qaeda activity, said some fighters had gone to Syria “in a personal capacity”.

A third senior TTP cadre said those who had gone were mostly Arabs, Uzbeks and Chechens.

More than 100,000 people have been killed since the uprising against Assad erupted, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Analyst Rahimullah Yusufzai dismissed claims of the TTP setting up camps in Syria as “a publicity campaign” by some of the militants.

“But we cannot deny the fact that they are quite ambitious and want to send a clear message to the world that they are still very strong and have strong linkages with other local and international groups,” he said.

Ismail, an Arab fighter from Al-Qaeda, told AFP in northwest Pakistan that he planned to join the fight against Assad.

“I am going to Syria in the next few days, my family will stay here,” he said.

“Our mujahideen are going not only to Syria but also to Lebanon, Egypt and other Arab countries.”

Saifullah Khan Mahsud, the executive director of the FATA Research Centre …read more

Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox World News

News, Politics, Government

Afghans arrest senior Pakistani Taliban

Leave a comment

Officials say a senior Pakistan Taliban commander who was hiding out in eastern Afghanistan has been arrested.

An Afghan security official said on Tuesday that Maulvi Faqir Mohammed was arrested over the weekend in eastern Nangarhar province near the Pakistani frontier.

Two Pakistani intelligence officials also confirmed the capture over the weekend. All the officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.

Mohammed, who was a top commander of the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, or TTP, fell out with the Taliban’s leadership in 2011 for saying the group was in peace negotiations with the Pakistani government.

The Taliban recently claimed it has patched up relations with him after the group announced that it was now ready to talk with the government.

…read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox World News

News, Politics, Government

Pakistani tribesmen pushing Taliban to talk peace

Leave a comment

Five years after setting up an umbrella organization to unite violent militant groups in the nation’s tribal regions, the Pakistani Taliban is fractured, strapped for cash and losing support of local tribesmen frustrated by a protracted war that has forced thousands from their homes, analysts and residents of the area said.

The temperamental chief of the group known as the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), Hakimullah Mehsud, recently offered to start peace talks with the government, raising the prospect of a negotiated end to Pakistan‘s war against insurgents in a lawless region that runs the length of the border with Afghanistan.

The group’s offer of sanctuary to Afghanistan‘s Taliban has been one of the most divisive issues in U.S.-Pakistan relations and has confounded efforts to get the upper hand against Afghan insurgents after more than 11 years of war.

Pakistan denies providing outright military and financial help to militants fighting in Afghanistan. With 120,000 Pakistani soldiers deployed in the tribal regions, Pakistan has waged its own bloody battle against insurgents that has left more than 4,000 soldiers dead.

In interviews with analysts, residents and militant experts, Mehsud’s network has emerged as a narrow collection of insurgents — often with links to criminal gangs — that has only limited influence in a vast tribal region overrun by scores of insurgent groups led by commanders with disparate agendas and varying loyalties.

Rather than a precursor to peace, Mehsud’s offer to talk peace is an attempt to regain stature, silence critics and gain concessions from a weak government heading into nationwide elections, according to those familiar with the militant organization.

Taliban spokesman Ehsanullah Ehsan has repeatedly denied reports of divisions within the TTP, including reported challenges to Mehsud’s leadership.

But Amir Rana, director of the Pakistan Institute of Peace Studies, said Mehsud’s offer to talk was an attempt to divert attention from internal rifts that are ripping the organization apart and diminishing its influence. Meshud speaks for fighters restricted to his own tribe, based in North and South Waziristan, he said.

“There is a lot of tension within the TTP. This peace offer I think basically comes from Hakimullah Mehsud and the Mehsud commanders,” Rana said.

Some of his most powerful commanders have broken away and set up their own fiefdoms in other parts …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox World News