Talks are not the answer

Pakistan has once again reiterated that it is not holding talks with the outlawed Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), stressing that it does not have any plans to negotiate with the terrorist organization in the future either. In what can only be called encouraging and correct, Foreign Office spokesperson Mumtaz Zahra Baloch has also said that Islamabad “expects the Afghan authorities to take action against these terror groups and their leadership for the crimes they are committing and terrorist attacks for which they are responsible in Pakistan”. This FO statement comes after Afghanistan’s Deputy Interior Minister Mohammad Nabi Omari advised Pakistan and the TTP to resolve their issues through dialogue. Not only that, he went on to say that the Afghan regime has got nothing to do with it, but they are getting the heat for it. “The escalation of conflict in Pakistan affects the situation in Afghanistan.”

It came as a surprise to many that a senior Afghan Taliban official had spoken publicly about the TTP and Pakistan. This is in all probability because fingers are now being pointed internationally at the Afghan regime for hosting and providing safe havens to terrorist outfits like the TTP on Afghan soil. Another reason could be that Pakistan carried out intelligence-based anti-terrorist operations in the border regions inside Afghanistan last month. Pakistan has been an ally of Afghanistan and even the Afghan Taliban over the years, but relations have soured between the two neighbours after the regime in Kabul has consistently refused to take any action whatsoever against the TTP.

Terrorist attacks in Pakistan have increased manifold ever since the fall of Kabul. Back then, observers had warned Islamabad that the Kabul regime was a ‘friend of the TTP’ and we must keep this in mind when dealing with them. Unfortunately, the PTI government in 2021 did not pay heed to these warnings and welcomed the Afghan Taliban’s advice that Pakistan should hold dialogue with the TTP. We even gave in to demands that no country in a position of power should have done. It was only because of this wrong move that the TTP got space and time to resettle and restrengthen itself. We are seeing the consequences of that now: multiple terrorist attacks across Pakistan. It took decades for Pakistan to root out terrorism from Pakistani soil after sacrificing thousands of innocent lives. To see terrorism making its way back into the country is painful for every Pakistani who remembers the sacrifices of our law-enforcement agencies and civilians vividly in the war on terror. This is also why the audacity of the Afghan Taliban to publicly ‘advise’ Pakistan to engage in talks with the TTP is appalling. Instead of stopping the TTP from crossing the border and carrying out terrorist attacks in neighbouring Pakistan, the Kabul regime expects us to hold another dialogue with the TTP when the terrorist outfit is on a rampage against our security forces and our civilians. Pakistan’s stance is the only correct way to deal with this. We have shown enough restraint and given ample warnings to Kabul. Terror broke Pakistan some years back. We cannot let it undo some of the healing that has been very slowly and carefully begun over the past few years.