Peace initiative: Difficult to pursue talks if TTP doesn’t take concrete steps, says Siddiqui

PM’s top aide says govt is facing public pressure on protracted dialogue.

A top aide of the prime minister has said that it’ll be difficult for the government to pursue peace talks, if the Taliban do not take immediate and concrete steps for taking the dialogue process forward.

“The government is facing public pressure on the issue. People are now demanding results of the [peace] process,” Irfan Siddiqui, the prime minister’s special adviser on national affairs told the BBC Urdu on Wednesday. He added that protracted talks did not augur well for the process.

“We had made it clear in the beginning [of the process] that we would try to take the process to a logical conclusion as soon as possible because this sensitive matter cannot continue for an indefinite period,” said Siddiqui, who was the coordinator of the first four-member negotiating committee formed by the premier to make peace with the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP).

He denied the reported tiff between the civil government and the military leadership vis-à-vis peace talks. “These are mere speculations and assumptions,” he added.

Over the past few weeks Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and army chief Gen Raheel Sharif have had several meetings where national issues were discussed in a friendly atmosphere, he said. “These one-on-one meetings should be enough to dispel all media speculations.”

Without naming anyone Siddiqui said some leaders were trying to mobilise political movements based on the presumed civil-military tensions.

He claimed that even Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf Chairman Imran Khan didn’t know the purpose of a protest movement he was planning to launch on May 11.

“Imran Khan has said that he doesn’t want midterm elections. He also wants continuation of the current democratic setup for the next five years. In this scenario, people are at a loss to understand the purpose of street rallies,” Siddiqui said.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 8^th, 2014.