TTP deputy chief's body handed over to family

Fateha for the slain deputy chief of the outlawed Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), Qari Amjad, continued for a second consecutive day on Saturday at the main mosque of Mayar Jandool. Large numbers of relatives, local residents, and friends from surrounding villages participated in the prayers.

According to family sources, the condolence gatherings will continue for three days in line with local customs and traditions. Qari Amjad, whose real name was Amjad Ali, was killed along with three associates in an intelligence-based operation near the Pakistan-Afghanistan border in Bajaur on the night between Wednesday and Thursday.

Military authorities handed over his body to the family on Thursday. The following morning, his remains were brought to his ancestral village, Mianyar Jandool, where his funeral prayer was offered in the central graveyard.

The funeral, attended by hundreds, was held openly with permission from security forces, an unusual move for a senior TTP leader, as such gatherings are normally restricted following the deaths of terrorist commanders.

Family sources said Qari Amjad was the son of Muhammad Siddiq Akhunzada, a local schoolteacher who passed away in 2001. He received his early religious education at a madrassa in Shahpur, Shangla, and later completed a Mufti course in Karachi. He joined the banned TTP alongside his younger brother Wajid Ali in 2007. Wajid was killed in 2010 during a clash with security forces in Samar Bagh after planting an IED.

Known within the TTP ranks as Mufti Mazahim and Hazrat Mufti Deeroji, Qari Amjad married a woman from Khanpur Tekeni in 2007 and had two sons and four daughters. The family later moved to Afghanistan, where he lived for several years. His eldest son, now 18, is studying at a religious seminary in Afghanistan, where the rest of the family still resides.

Two of his stepbrothers, Abdul Majid and Muhammad Farooq, live in Mayar Jandool as civilians; Majid works as a schoolteacher. Two uncles, Muhammad Saleem and Ghulam Nasir Akhunzada, were detained by security forces in 2010 following Qari Amjad's emergence as a TTP figure and were held for 18 months at the Blambat Scouts Fort before being cleared.

Sources said Qari Amjad rose through the ranks during his stay in Afghanistan to become the deputy to current TTP Chief Noor Wali Mehsud. In 2022, the United States designated him a global terrorist, accusing him of cross-border attacks and terrorists operations, while Pakistan had placed a bounty of Rs5 million on his head.

In a statement released on social media, the TTP described his killing as a "betrayal", while Pakistani authorities termed it the outcome of a precise intelligence-based operation. Conflicting reports have since emerged, with some claims suggesting that he was killed inside Pakistan rather than across the border.

The development comes amid reports that Pakistan and the Afghan Taliban may soon resume talks in Istanbul, with Islamabad pressing Kabul to formally declare the TTP a terrorist organization and take action against it.