Prime Minister Anwaar-ul-Haq Kakar on Friday categorically ruled out any scope for talks with the defunct Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), by saying that the state of Pakistan was powerful enough to fight them even for the next 100 years.
While responding to a media query regarding impediments in talks with the banned terror outfit, the Premier said that the biggest obstacle was that no one was willing to talk to them. The state doesn’t want to talk to them now or in the future.
Terrorism has been a great challenge in Pakistan over the past more than two decades, with various extremist groups including the Tahreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and its splinter cabal carrying out attacks in various parts of the country with a specific focus on Erstwhile FATA, the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan.
Historically, the TTP and its affiliates have played a significant role in spreading terrorism and violence in Pakistan from 2003 to 2014. Pakistan’s Security and Law Enforcement Agencies had been hunting down the terrorist sleeper cells and their sympathizers in major cities while brave Pakistani military chased terrorists’ hideouts in far-flung hilly areas in Swat, North and South Waziristan, Kurram and Khyber districts adjoining Pak-Afghan border along the Durand line.
There had been a series of major military operations against terrorist groups in KP’s border regions, ending with the successful operation Zarb-e-Azb that completely wiped out the menace of terrorism from Pakistani soil, while the remains of terrorism took refuge in neighbouring Afghanistan.
Later, the PTI government and then military establishment got trapped in a foreign conspiracy, brought back hundreds of TTP terrorists in the country and reimported terrorism on Pakistani soil through a treacherous accord with the terrorist outfit.
Since then a death dance and bloodshed continuously pouring down in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Erstwhile FATA while hundreds of innocent civilians, and Security personnel embraced martyrdoms in acts of violence and terrorism over the past few months.
Recently, the Pakistani military has launched a fresh countrywide intelligence-based counter-terrorism campaign and inflicted heavy losses on terrorist outfits by killing dozens of terrorists, destroying their hideouts/caches, recovering arms and ammunition and arresting their facilitators in the country.
Currently, the terrorists are on the run and dearly need some pause in the government campaign against terrorism while the garb of talks and dialogue is the best strategy for them to regain strength, regroup and reequip their mercenaries before the next round of bloodshed.
Interestingly, Pakistani leadership and the public had always overlooked their national and country’s interests, displaying an exaggerated sense of Muslim brotherhood, the imaginary idea of an Islamic state, Khilafat and Riasaat-e-Madina by failing to rationally identify the true motives of characterless, self-claimed Champion of Islam and Jihad in this hybrid world.
Currently, terrorism has caused serious security risks for the country, while banned terrorist gangs consisting of a few hundred mercenaries have plans to create their separate state and want to pressure the Pakistani leadership through violence, intimidation and so-called ploy of dialogue/ negotiation.
In fact, Pakistan has had a complex history in dealing with terrorism. The successive governments have taken steps to combat terrorism, and the effectiveness of its measures has been a subject of debate. The previous PTI government used the recipe of dialogue and accord that not only revived the risk of terrorism again but exposed the nefarious designs of terrorist outfits to the nation.
Pakistan has initiated various military operations implemented diverse counter-terrorism strategies and held multiple rounds of talks with banned outfits in the past. There have been calls both domestic and international to take a zero-tolerance stance against terrorism by providing no space for its revival. The current government has finally initiated a countrywide Counter terrorism campaign to eradicate this menace once and for all.
All segments of society must support the government wholeheartedly in its endeavours without casting any doubts or echoing in favour of futile dialogues if we intend to secure our future generations from the clutches of terrorism forever, otherwise, this curse would not be curbed for decades.
