Terror returns with the TTP
Many in Pakistan remember the terrorist attacks perpetrated by the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) as if they were yesterday. The TTP, the Pakistani offshoot of the Taliban movement, was set up in 2007. It is not, however, a homogeneous organisation, but rather a loose affiliation of various groups that from time to time fight for supremacy within the TTP.
This terrorist organisation is responsible for hundreds of attacks with thousands of victims, including the attacks on the army headquarters in Rawalpindi in 2009, on Ahmadi mosques in Lahore in 2010, and on the activist and subsequent Nobel Peace Prize winner Malala Yousafzai in 2012.
One of its worst attacks was on a school in Peshawar in 2014, during which 130 schoolchildren were massacred. This brutal attack led to a noticeable change in atmosphere in Pakistan. The country's political leadership responded to the attack by adopting what was known as the National Action Plan, outlining a course of rigorous action to resolutely fight the terrorist organisation in Pakistan. In the process, the government stepped up the Zarb-e-Azb military operation, launched shortly before the adoption of the plan, which was targeting terrorist groups in the remote tribal homelands along the border with Afghanistan.
In the years that followed, the Pakistani army succeeded in largely banishing the TTP from Pakistan, but not without major fighting and heavy loss of life. Many of the TTP's leaders and fighters fled across the border to Afghanistan – and the wave of terrorist attacks gradually ebbed.
At the same time, the killing of several TTP leaders in U.S. drone attacks led to internal power struggles and a fragmentation of the organisation. Nevertheless, the TTP was not entirely destroyed. Its close ideological and historical ties to the Afghan Taliban helped it to survive.
Time and again, the TTP managed to launch attacks on Pakistani border posts from inside Afghanistan, which led to tension between the governments in Islamabad and Kabul. Pakistan insisted that Kabul take decisive action against the terrorist group. For its part, the Afghan government at the time accused Pakistan's secret service of supporting the Afghan Taliban and tolerating its presence in Pakistan.
Any attempts by Pakistan's leadership to persuade the Taliban in Afghanistan to extradite TTP leaders to Pakistan failed utterly, despite the close ties between the two. In particular, the influential Haqqani faction within the Afghan Taliban, which maintains close ties to the TTP, was opposed to such extraditions.
It is now considered certain that the former Afghan secret service, NDS, which was disbanded when the Taliban returned to power, had secret ties to the TTP, with a view to using them as a bargaining chip with Pakistan. That much had already been claimed by former TTP spokesman Ehsanullah Ehsan in a video back in 2017.
Consolidation of the TTP
Following the death of TTP leader Mullah Fazlullah in a U.S. drone attack in 2018, his deputy, Noor Wali, was named head of the group. Under his leadership, a process of consolidation began within the TTP. Noor Wali largely succeeded in uniting the warring factions within the TTP under his leadership. He is seen as one of the terrorist organisation's veteran fighters.
In a publication in 2017, he claimed responsibility for the 2007 suicide attack that killed Benazir Bhutto in the garrison city of Rawalpindi. Meanwhile, the military successes of the Afghan Taliban also strengthened the TTP. According to an assessment by U.S. security forces from 2019, the TTP has between 3,000 and 5,000 members.
When the Taliban conquered Afghanistan with lightning speed in the summer of 2021 and the Afghan army practically disintegrated, there was a certain euphoria among Islamist parties and sections of the military in Pakistan. Pakistani prime minister at the time, Imran Khan, saw the Taliban victory as confirmation of his opinion that there could be no military solution to the Afghanistan conflict.
When the radical Islamists seized power in Kabul, Khan said that the Taliban were "breaking the chains of slavery". When the Taliban marched into Kabul, so too did many TTP fighters. They proudly posed for cameras with Afghan army vehicles. At the time, Pakistan demanded that the new rulers in Kabul take a harder line on its Pakistani sister organisation or at least guarantee that Afghan territory would not be used to launch attacks on Pakistan.
Negotiations between the TTP and Pakistan
Pressurised by the Taliban, the TTP announced a ceasefire in May 2022 and declared itself willing to negotiate with Imran Khan's government, which was led by the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party. Some TTP fighters returned to the Pakistani regions of Swat and Dir, from whence they had been ousted in 2007 following a bloody military operation. Despite statements to the contrary, Khan's government had obviously promised that TTP fighters could return in exchange for a ceasefire.
Don't be fooled by TTP distancing itself from today's attack. It was claimed by Jamaat-ul-Ahrar , which is very much a part of TTP after a brief split some years ago. It's one of TTP's most brutal factions & is happy to do things (like attack mosques) that TTP claims it rejects.
— Michael Kugelman (@MichaelKugelman) January 31, 2023
In early 2023, Imran Khan confirmed his government had at the time been willing to allow up to 5,000 TTP fighters and their families to return. The civilian population was appalled by the presence of the radicals. Many feared a return to the days when the TTP controlled large areas of Swat and introduced a reign of terror.
During the military operations that followed, hundreds of thousands were forced to leave their homes. In an already difficult economic situation, another military conflict would have had catastrophic consequences for the civilian population. In the border province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, the local population has in recent times demonstrated repeatedly against the return of the TTP.
A rise in the number of terrorist attacks
Negotiations between the TTP and the Pakistani government finally broke down in November 2022. In response, the TTP announced that it was ending its ceasefire. Since then, there has been a noticeable increase in the number of terrorist attacks. Armed clashes between Pakistani security forces and the TTP have practically become a daily occurrence.
The TTP is attacking police stations and military posts in an effort to demonstrate its ability to strike. The most devastating attack in recent weeks took place in Peshawar in January 2023, when a TTP suicide bomber blew himself up in a mosque attended mostly by members of the police force. Over 100 people lost their lives in the attack.
In view of the security situation, Pakistan's current prime minister, Shehbaz Sharif, announced during a meeting of the National Security Council on 7 April that he intended to crack down even more on the terrorists. However, no attempt is being made to counter extremist ideologies in the country. To this day, radical mullahs can spread their views freely, without fear of any serious repercussions from the state. Poverty and poor prospects lend these views added appeal, especially among the young.
De-radicalisation cannot be achieved by military means alone, which is why human rights activists like Yasser Latif Hamdani have for years been calling for a return to the secular ideals of Pakistan's founding father, Muhammad Ali Jinnah. For this to happen, fundamental changes would have to be made. From the constitution to school curricula, the process of Islamisation – started by Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and completed during the dictatorship of Zia ul-Haq – that is devouring Pakistani society from the inside out would have to be reversed.
© Qantara.de 2023
Translated from the German by Aingeal Flanagan
Mohammad Luqman is an Islamic scholar and South Asia expert with a special research focus on Pakistan.