The armed group calls off a truce agreed with the federal government in June and orders fighters to ‘perform assaults in all the nation’.
Islamabad, Pakistan – The armed group Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), also referred to as the Pakistani Taliban, has introduced the tip of an indefinite ceasefire agreed with the federal government in June and issued orders to its fighters to hold out assaults throughout the nation.
“As army operations are ongoing towards mujahideen in numerous areas, … so it’s crucial so that you can perform assaults wherever you may in all the nation,” the group mentioned in a press release on Monday.
The group, which is ideologically aligned with the Afghan Taliban, mentioned it’s dealing with a rising variety of assaults by the Pakistani army, notably within the Lakki Marwat district of Pakistan’s northwestern province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
“We undergo the individuals of Pakistan that we’ve got repeatedly warned you and continued to be affected person in order that the negotiation course of just isn’t sabotaged at the least by us, however the military and intelligence businesses don’t cease and proceed the assaults, so now our retaliatory assaults may even begin throughout the nation,” the assertion mentioned.
Al Jazeera reached out to the Pakistani army for remark however didn’t obtain a response.
The TTP has been waging a insurrection towards the state of Pakistan for greater than a decade. The group calls for the imposition of hardline Islamic regulation regulation, launch of key members arrested by the federal government and a reversal of the merger of Pakistan’s tribal areas with Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.
On November 16, the TTP claimed duty for an assault on a police patrol in Lakki Marwat, about 200km (125 miles) southwest of the provincial capital, Peshawar. Six policemen have been killed.
After the assault, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif mentioned “terrorism” continues to be certainly one of Pakistan’s foremost issues.
The TTP made its declaration hours after the federal government mentioned the state minister for overseas affairs, Hina Rabbani Khar, will go to Afghanistan on Tuesday.
In response to the overseas ministry, Khar will maintain talks on regional safety with the Taliban authorities in Kabul.
Safety specialist Asfandyar Mir of america Institute of Peace instructed Al Jazeera that whereas the TTP has been escalating its violence just lately, it has additionally exercised restraint by not finishing up assaults exterior tribal areas.
“I’ve inferred the focusing on as a operate of Afghan Taliban stress on the TTP to calibrate their escalation,” he saId. “Now if the TTP follows by way of in its declaration of countrywide assaults, the important thing query is how will the Taliban reply.”
The federal government and the TTP have held a number of rounds of talks facilitated by the Afghan Taliban, the final of which passed off in June. The talks started weeks after the Taliban took management of Kabul final yr.
Regardless of the ceasefire, the TTP continued its assaults this yr, saying they have been defensive in nature and solely in retaliation for operations carried out by Pakistan’s army.
In response to information compiled by the Pakistan Institute for Peace Research, an Islamabad-based analysis organisation, at the least 65 such assaults passed off in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa by way of the tip of October. They killed at the least 98 individuals and wounded 75, it mentioned.