Maulana Yousaf Shah, called for keeping the dialogue process on track despite the recent setbacks. PHOTO: PPI
MIRAMSHAH/ PESHAWAR/ ISLAMABAD:
The Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) offered Wednesday to observe a ceasefire to allow the resumption of stalled peace talks, provided security forces stop killing and arresting its members.
The offer came a day after a four-member government negotiating committee suspended dialogue just weeks after it was announced following a weekend claim by the TTP Mohmand chapter that it has executed 23 kidnapped paramilitary Frontier Corps (FC) troops. The government negotiators set a ceasefire as a precondition for another round of talks.
“We are ready for the ceasefire if the government assures us that bodies of our colleagues will not be found in gunny bags and they will not be killed in encounters and arrested in raids,” the TTP central spokesperson Shahidullah Shahid told AFP by phone from an undisclosed location.
“The government has killed more than 60 Taliban since the start of the peace talks, in Karachi and the rest of the country, under a secret operation codenamed Operation Root Out,” Shahid said.
“The killings of [FC] soldiers in Mohmand Agency were in response to the onslaught on Taliban members by security forces during the talks between government and Taliban committees,” he added. “The day [the FC troops were executed] 10 of our colleagues were killed while such killings have been continuing for the past several days from Karachi to Peshawar.”
Shahid said the TTP still favoured to take the peace process forward. “We have assured the entire nation that we are serious in the restoration of peace. We sincerely proposed to the government [negotiating] committee to assure our intermediaries of halting all actions against us,” he added.
Asked to comment on the TTP’s ceasefire offer, a member of the government committee said, “We have already conveyed our message in clear words and we don’t want to add anything.”
He denied that the Taliban intermediaries had conveyed any TTP demands to the government committee. “The Taliban have not formally informed us about their demands,” he added.
The coordinator of the government committee, Irfan Siddiqui, refused to offer comments on the matter. “We have already said what we have to say in loud and clear words. We have conveyed our stance to the prime minister, to the Taliban committee, and to the nation,” he told The Express Tribune.
“Things are as they were [after the Mohmand Agency executions],” he added. However, he did not say the government had abandoned the peace process. Siddiqui said the Taliban intermediary committee also wanted restoration of peace in the country and “we have high regard for them”.
On Tuesday, the government committee held an emergency meeting and then informed the prime minister that it was not possible for the members to carry forward peace talks in the given circumstances. After their meeting with the premier, an official statement was issued which asked the Taliban to unconditionally cease all violent activities without any delay.
Over in Peshawar, the coordinator of the Taliban intermediary committee, Maulana Yousaf Shah, called for keeping the dialogue process on track despite the recent setbacks.
Talking to reporters at the Peshawar Press Club on Wednesday, he disclosed that some members of the government committee have informally contacted them. He added that Interior Minister Chaudary Nisar Ali Khan has also spoken to JUI-S chief Maulana Samiul Haq on the issue.
Maulana Shah revealed that on February 17, they were about to announce a ceasefire but some incidents led to a deadlock. “Now, it’s necessary that the talks are not disrupted in the aftermath of these incidents,” he added.
“The talks are again heading for a deadlock, after a similar situation was averted some days back,” he said and blamed the government side for it.
Referring to government committee’s demand to the TTP, Maulana Shah said a “royal decree does not solve issues. These have to be solved through dialogue”.
He also suggested that PTI chief Imran Khan and JUI-F head Fazlur Rehman take part in the dialogue process.
Published in The Express Tribune, February 20th, 2014.
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