North Waziristan: Haqqani aide threatens to scrap peace deal

Hafiz Gul Bahadur criticises govt for allowing US drone strikes.

MIRANSHAH/ PESHAWAR: Amidst continuing US drone strikes in tribal regions, a powerful Taliban commander has threatened to scrap a peace agreement signed with the government in 2007 and turn his fighters against Islamabad.

The threat from Hafiz Gul Bahadur, considered to be the protégé of the Haqqani network in the North Waziristan Agency, raises the spectre of renewed violence in the country.

Unlike the banned Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), which is based in neighbouring South Waziristan Agency, Bahadur’s fighters mainly aid the Haqqani network in fighting US-led Nato forces in Afghanistan.

In pamphlets distributed in the main market in Miramshah, the main town in North Waziristan, Bahadur criticised Pakistani leaders for allowing the US to conduct drone attacks in North Waziristan and said the council of militant groups he heads would no longer hold talks with the government.

“We have been exercising patience because of problems being faced by common people but now the government has also resorted to repression on our common people at the behest of foreigners,” said Bahadur in the pamphlets carrying the name of Hafiz Gul Bahadur, Masul-wa-Khadimul Mujahideen North Waziristan.

He accused the government of firing mortar bombs and cannons on civilians and demolishing a hospital and other buildings in North Waziristan.

Army officials were not immediately available for comment. Local military officials said “terrorists” had used public buildings to launch rocket attacks at military checkpoints.

“We are disbanding the jirga [council] set up for talks with the government. If the government resorts to any repressive act in the future then it will also be very difficult for us to show patience,” said Bahadur.

Sources say it’s unclear whether Bahadur disbanded the Waziristan Grand Peace Jirga, which has been overseeing peace with government since 2007, or some other jirga.

Bahadur, believed to have thousands of fighters, reached a peace agreement with the government of Pakistan in 2007. But it has been strained lately.

Two clerics who are leaders of the committee that oversees the pact, Maulana Gul Ramazan and Hafiz Noorullah Shah, suggested the army had violated the deal.

Even though party leaders openly criticise the drone attacks, saying they play into the hands of militants, analysts argue that strikes which kill high-value al Qaeda and Taliban targets would not be possible without help from intelligence agencies in Pakistan.

Bahadur’s threat came days after security forces blew up some buildings in Miramshah in a hunt for militants.

Chemists and druggists in Miramshah also protested against the demolition of the buildings. All chemists and private clinics remained closed on Saturday.  President of the Chemists and Druggists Association Ahmeduddin demanded compensation for the destroyed property and said that they would stage a sit-in outside the Parliament House and move the Supreme Court if their demands were not met.

The protesters allege that security forces blew up Shawal Medical Complex in the Dattakhel Adda area of Miramshah and damaged at least 50 shops.

(WITH ADDITIONAL INPUT FROM REUTERS)

Published in The Express Tribune, November 13^th, 2011.