The TTP conundrum

Old habits die hard. The idiom pretty much explains the mindset of Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan who revels in being a trigger-happy militant group, with terrorism as their motto. Why else would they snap the month-long ceasefire agreement, reached with the government last month on flimsy grounds?
It was early November when the Imran Khan-led PTI government reached the unpopular agreement with the TTP, earning public ire and infuriating the critics who were clearly up in arms over negotiations held with the militant group. The reaction is only natural. During the past two decades, the TTP has constantly made attempts to destabilise and overthrow the governments in Islamabad and has been involved in a series of brutal acts of terrorism, none more ghastly than the attack on Army Public School, Peshawar in 2014.
Moreover, the TTP’s abrupt pull out of the November ceasefire agreement is in keeping with the insurgents’ dubious track record of not honouring the commitments made during previous such peace initiatives taken by the governments. Back in 2011, too, just hours after stating that the TTP would cease attacks on Pakistani targets and will join forces with the Afghan Taliban and focus all of its insurgent activity on US and international forces in Afghanistan, they launched a series of attacks on the Pakistan security forces that included the brutal killing of 10 Pakistani Frontier Constabulary soldiers.
However, the TTP has yet to show any remorse for its actions. The toxic culture in its rank and file has seen them shunning all advice to mend its violent ways.
Recently, video footage showing TTP chief Noor Wali Mehsud claiming the group is a branch of the Taliban Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan (IEA) was indicative of the internal wrangling it could be experiencing. “Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan is a branch of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, [and] is a part of that umbrella on this land,” Mehsud said in the video.

However, Afghan Taliban government spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid denied the claim. “They are not, as an organization, part of IEA and we don’t share the same objectives,” Mujahid told Arab News. “The IEA stance is that we do not interfere in other countries’ affairs,” he claimed.

The IEA response was quite blunt and could have come as a shock to the TTP since it has only been a month since Afghanistan’s acting Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi had acknowledged that the Afghan Taliban were mediating between the TTP and Pakistan for a truce.

The big question is, whatever compelled the hardline TTP to claim such an affiliation with the Afghan government? To many, it appeared like a desperate bid to collaborate with a more powerful force – either for survival or, perhaps, to reorganise itself.

To the knowledgeable critics and those following the Taliban politics closely, discord in the TTP’s own ranks as well as Pakistan government’s hybrid strategy in tackling the group has led them to seek fresh reassurance from a supposed ally. Last Thursday the TTP spokesperson Muhammad Khurasani ruled out the possibility of extending the truce with Pakistan government, saying the government had violated some parts of the deal and continued to raid their hideouts near the Afghan border in northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.
Besides, the government’s delay in formation of negotiation committee and release of its activists also irked the TTP.
The analysts believe that the TTP today is grappling with many issues. The lack of unity among its ranks is a major worry for TTP while it is also feeling insecure in the face of the Afghan Taliban’s renewed stance of peace and harmony after taking the reins in Afghanistan in August.

The TTP, once united under its leader Baitullah Mehsud, is fragmented and its existing leadership regularly disagrees over control of territory. Though, during the past, the key unifying factor keeping all the disparate Pakistani Taliban factions from fighting each other was their struggle for survival in the face of numerous military operations, the scenario has definitely changed.
Various Tehreek-e Taliban leaders do not share the same war strategy. For example, the TTP faction in Bajaur Agency, led by Maulvi Faqir Muhammad, did not protest when Pakistan’s military launched a series of operations against the TTP a few years ago. The Waziristan-based Pakistani Taliban leaders such as Hafiz Gul Bahadar and Maulvi Nazir also purportedly do not approve of the TTP’s policies of waging war against Pakistani security forces and are more focused on fighting the US and NATO forces in Afghanistan.
In this backdrop, TTP’s abrupt snapping of truce with the Pakistan government appears to be pressure tactics, stemming from divisions within the umbrella grouping of militant outfits over how to deal with the government’s peace initiative.
Having said that, the government as well as the TTP leadership appear confused in their eventual goals. The fact that terms and framework of the government-TTP talks were never made public is a testament to the lack of strategy and confidence on the government’s part. That spells disaster for all concerned, more significantly for the country’s 220 million population who haplessly watch the light at the end of the tunnel disappear.

The writer is News Editor, Bol News