Terrorists have become more active in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa provinceSince the end of 2022, the terrorist organization Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP, banned in the Russian Federation) has been actively regrouping.
The TTP is an alliance of extremist networks that have been fighting the Pakistani government since 2007.
The TTP is particularly active in the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province on the border with Afghanistan. For example, on October 10, 2022, on the tenth anniversary of the attack on Nobel Laureate Malala Yousafzai, an incident occurred in the province.
Unknown gunmen opened fire on a school bus in the Swat district, killing the driver and wounding several students.
The attack occurred shortly after reports of the activation of TTP militants in Swat.
Shortly after this incident, the TTP increased the number of attacks on members of the security forces of Pakistan. One of the largest attacks occurred on December 18, 2022 in the military complex of Bannu District (Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa). The militants captured several officers of the anti-terrorism directorate.
It took the security forces two days to clean up the complex. Three members of the security forces were killed, 25 TTP militants were eliminated.
Dozens of members of the group were in custody in the complex of the Department for Combating Terrorism. The militants seized the guards, seized their weapons and not only released the prisoners, but also detained several security forces in the building, demanding that the government ensure their safe return to Afghanistan.
After two days of negotiations, the special services unit conducted an operation and eliminated all the militants.
The beginning of an open confrontation between the TTP and the Pakistani authorities in 2007 was marked by the siege of the Lal Masjid mosque in Islamabad by a terrorist group.
The subsequent military operation "Zarb-e-Azb" weakened the TTP network in federally administered tribal territories, the militants were forced into Afghanistan. These measures helped to reduce the number of terrorist attacks for a while.
After the capture of Kabul by the Afghan Taliban (the Taliban movement is banned in the Russian Federation) in August 2021, the TTP began regrouping.
This contradicted the expectations of Pakistani politicians, who believed that the Afghan Taliban, who wanted to gain legitimacy, would cooperate with the Government of Pakistan.
Of the major cities in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province, Swat has the longest history of fighting TTP militants. The group of Mullah Fazluly tried to establish control over the area in the same 2007.
The Pakistani military feared that the TTP might try to capture Islamabad, and therefore launched Operation Rah-e-Rast to expel the militants.
As a result, the military managed to temporarily rid the Swat Valley of the influence of the TPP. But as time passed, the militants began to reappear in the mountains of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province. Their tactics are characterized by the use of improvised explosive devices and the commission of targeted killings.
Now that the Taliban is in power in Afghanistan and maintains close ties with the TPP, Islamabad faces additional challenges. The fall of the pro-Western regime in Afghanistan was a landmark event for the TTP, inspired by the capture of Kabul.
The TTP leadership believed that the group could also seize Pakistan – or at least establish Sharia law in some part of the country, for example, in the same Bannu in the south of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.
Behind-the-scenes negotiations between the TTP and the Government of Pakistan with the assistance of the Afghan Taliban have untied the hands of the group. Some of its fighters returned to the Swat Valley with the permission of the Pakistani government, although this caused outrage among the local population. Hundreds of people took to the streets of the cities of the province in protest.
Meanwhile, the Pakistani Government continues to put pressure on the Afghan Taliban to facilitate the participation of the TPP in the negotiations. Although previous attempts at dialogue did not bring success. The parties did not agree with each other's demands.
The TTP uses Afghan territory to attack targets in Pakistan and conducts subversive activities on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border.
It is not surprising that this has become a source of tension in relations between Afghanistan and Pakistan. On the other hand, Pakistani security forces carried out attacks on the TTP hideout in Afghanistan, which sparked protests in Kabul.
Over the years, the TPP has become a threat not only to the border areas, but also to Pakistan as a whole. Pakistan seems unable to control this threat.
An illustrative example is the activation of radical elements in the Swat Valley, which is not a border area. It is possible that the TPP will reach Islamabad.
The Pakistani government must take immediate measures to suppress the TTP before the group becomes impossible to contain.
Larisa Shashok
