Pakistani Taliban
The Pakistani Taliban (Urdu: پاکستانی طالبان), formally called the Tehreek-e-Taliban-e-Pakistan (تحریکِ طالبان پاکستان, lit. 'Pakistani Taliban Movement', abbr. TTP), is an umbrella organization of various Islamist armed militant groups operating along the Afghan–Pakistani border. Formed in 2007 by Baitullah Mehsud, its current leader is Noor Wali Mehsud, who has publicly pledged allegiance to the Afghan Taliban (a.k.a. Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan).[22][1] The Pakistani Taliban share a common ideology with the Afghan Taliban and have assisted them in the 2001–2021 war, but the two groups have separate operation and command structures.[24][25]
This article is about the Pakistani Taliban. For the Afghan Taliban, see Taliban. For the Tajik Taliban, see Jamaat Ansarullah. For other uses, see Pakistani Taliban (disambiguation). For the allied group in Punjab, see Punjabi Taliban.Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan
Pakistani Taliban
(پاکستانی طالبان)
- Baitullah Mehsud †[1]
(2007–09) - Hakimullah Mehsud †[2][3]
(2009–13) - Fazal Hayat †[4]
(2013–18) - Noor Wali Mehsud
(since 2018)
- Baitullah Mehsud †[1]
December 2007 – present
Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan (self-declared, publicly rejected by IEA)[5][6]
Eastern Afghanistan[17]
Most Taliban groups in Pakistan coalesce under the TTP.[41] Among the stated objectives of TTP is resistance against the Pakistani state.[1][42] The TTP's aim is to overthrow the government of Pakistan by waging a terrorist campaign against the Pakistan armed forces and the state.[43] The TTP depends on the tribal belt along the Afghanistan–Pakistan border, from which it draws its recruits. The TTP receives ideological guidance from and maintains ties with al-Qaeda.[43] After the Pakistani military operations in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, some of the TTP militants escaped from Pakistan to Afghanistan,[44] where some of them joined Islamic State – Khorasan Province, while others remained part of the TTP.[45] As of 2019, there are around 3,000 to 4,000 TTP militants in Afghanistan, according to a United States Department of Defense report.[20][46][47] Between July and November 2020, the Amjad Farouqi group, one faction of the Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, the Musa Shaheed Karwan group, Mehsud factions of the TTP, Mohmand Taliban, Bajaur Taliban, Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, and Hizb-ul-Ahrar merged with TTP. This reorganization made TTP more deadly and led to increased attacks.[48]
In 2020, after years of factionalism and infighting, the TTP under the leadership of Noor Wali Mehsud underwent reorganization and reunification. Mehsud has essentially steered the TTP in a new direction, sparing civilians and ordering assaults only on security and law enforcement personnel, in an attempt to rehabilitate the group's image and distance them from the Islamic State militant group's extremism.[49]
After the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan in August 2021, Pakistan was unable to persuade the Afghan Taliban to crack down on the TTP.[50] The Afghan Taliban instead mediated talks between Pakistan and the TTP, leading to the release of dozens of TTP prisoners in Pakistan and a temporary ceasefire between the Pakistani government and the TTP.[51][52][53] After the ceasefire expired on 10 December 2021, the TTP increased attacks on Pakistani security forces from sanctuaries inside Afghanistan. The Pakistani airstrikes in Afghanistan's Khost and Kunar provinces on 16 April 2022 appeared to have been conducted in retaliation to the surge in terror attacks in Pakistan.[54]
History
Roots and development
The roots of the TTP as an organization began in 2002 when the Pakistani military conducted incursions into the tribal areas to originally combat foreign (Afghan, Arab and Central Asian) militants fleeing from the war in Afghanistan into the neighboring tribal areas of Pakistan.[55][56] A 2004 article by the BBC explains:
Organizational structure
Overview
The TTP differs in structure to the Afghan Taliban in that it lacks a central command and is a much looser coalition of various militant groups, united by hostility towards the central government in Islamabad.[13][14][15] Several analysts describe the TTP's structure as a loose network of dispersed constituent groups that vary in size and in levels of coordination.[57] The various factions of the TTP tend to be limited to their local areas of influence and often lack the ability to expand their operations beyond that territory.[85]
In its original form, the TTP had Baitullah Mehsud as its amir. He was followed in the leadership hierarchy by Hafiz Gul Bahadur as naib amir, or deputy. Faqir Mohammed was the third most influential leader.[1] The group contained members from all of FATA's seven tribal agencies as well as several districts of the North-West Frontier Province (NWFP), including Swat, Bannu, Tank, Lakki Marwat, Dera Ismail Khan, Kohistan, Buner, and Malakand.[1] Some 2008 estimates placed the total number of operatives at 30–35,000, although it is difficult to judge the reliability of such estimates.[55]
In the aftermath of Baitullah Mehsud's death, the organization experienced turmoil among its leading militants. By the end of August 2009, however, leading members in the TTP had confirmed Hakimullah Mehsud as its second amir. Government and some TTP sources told the media that Hakimullah Mehsud was killed in January 2010 by injuries sustained during a U.S. drone attack. Unconfirmed reports from Orakzai Agency stated, after the death of Hakimullah Mehsud, Malik Noor Jamal, alias Maulana Toofan, had assumed leadership of the TTP until the group determined how to proceed.[86][87]
Reuters, citing a report from The Express Tribune, indicated in July 2011 that Hakimullah Mehsud's grip on the TTP leadership was weakening after the defection of Fazal Saeed Haqqani, the TTP leader in the Kurram region, from the umbrella militant group. Haqqani cited disagreements over attacks on civilians as reason for the split. The paper quoted an associate of Mehsud's as saying that "it looks as though he is just a figurehead now... He can hardly communicate with his commanders in other parts of the tribal areas ... he is in total isolation. Only a few people within the TTP know where he is."[88] A December 2011 report published in The Express Tribune further described the network as "crumbling" with "funds dwindling and infighting intensifying." According to various TTP operatives, the difficulties stemmed from differences of opinion within TTP leadership on pursuing peace talks with Islamabad.[89] In December 2012 senior Pakistan military officials told Reuters that Hakimullah Mehsud had lost control of the group and that Wali-ur-Rehman was expected to be formally announced as the head of the TTP.[90] However a video released later in the month showed Hakimullah Mehsud and Wali-ur-Rehman seated next to each other, with Mehsud calling reports of a split between the two as propaganda.[91] Mehsud and Rahman were later killed in separate airstrikes in 2013.[92][93]
In February 2020, the TTP reported the deaths of four TTP senior leaders within a one-week period.[94] All of these four leaders, among them former TTP deputy leader Sheikh Khalid Haqqani and Hakimullah Mehsud group leader Sheharyar Mehsud,[95][96] were killed within a month of each other as well.[94]