TTP shura contacts TTP intermediaries for the first time since deadlock

Professor Mohammad Ibrahim says ceasefire would have been agreed upon yesterday if the 23 FC men were not killed.

PESHAWAR: The Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) shura contacted the TTP intermediary committee for the first time since the deadlock, stated Professor Mohammad Ibrahim, who is one of the members of the TTP committee, Express News reported on Tuesday.

During a press conference on February 17, Professor Ibrahim had said that the TTP committee was a neutral body acting as a bridge between the government and the TTP in the talks process.

Professor Ibrahim said that he was in contact with the TTP shura via telephone and discussed the killings of the 23 Frontier Corps (FC) men with them.

The peace talks took a new turn two weeks after they began following a claim from the Mohmand Agency chapter of the TTP on February 16 that they had executed 23 soldiers who were kidnapped in June 2010.

The paramilitary soldiers from the Frontier Corps (FC) vanished after the TTP attacked their check post in Mohmand tribal district on June 17, 2010.

Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had called the deaths “heinous” and warned they would impact attempts at reconciliation, while government peace negotiators pulled out of scheduled talks.

Professor Ibrahim further said that ceasefire would have been agreed upon yesterday if the Mohmand incident had not happened.

The government negotiators and TTP intermediaries were scheduled to meet on February 17 but the meeting was called off after the killings.

Negotiators

TTP shura – Qari Shakil Ahmed Haqqani, TTP spokesperson Azam Tariq, Maulana Amir Islam, Commander Ahmed, Anwar Gandapuri, Quetta division leader known as Pir Sahab, Maulana Abdullah, Yasir and Commander Pashtun.

TTP intermediaries – Prof Mohammad Ibrahim, Maulana Yousaf Shah and Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Samiul Haq (JUI-S) chief Maulana Samiul Haq.

Government committee – Adviser to the Prime Minister on National Affairs Irfan Siddiqui, former ISI official Major (retd) Muhammad Amir, senior journalist Rahimullah Yousufzai, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf leader and former Pakistan ambassador to Afghanistan Rustam Shah Mohmand.