Peace negotiators hold informal meeting

Govt team repeats stance that stalled dialogue would be resumed only after TTP declares unconditional ceasefire.

ISLAMABAD:

Even though the peace process remains suspended, government negotiators had an ‘informal’ meeting with the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) intermediaries on Monday.

Rustam Shah Mohmand, a member of the government’s four-member negotiating committee, confirmed to The Express Tribune that the two sides met ‘informally’ in the presence of Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan.

The government team repeated its stance that the stalled dialogue would be resumed only after the TTP declared an unconditional ceasefire and stopped all hostilities. In return, the government has also promised ‘some positive gestures’.

This was the first contact between the two sides after the government suspended the peace process in reaction to the slaying of 23 paramilitary Frontier Corps troops by the Mohmand chapter of the TTP on February 17.

“We have set certain preconditions for the resumption of talks. And an end to hostilities against the government is one of them,” he added.

Mohmand denied media reports that the government committee had ceased to exist.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 26^th, 2014.