Taliban threaten to target PML-N leadership, Sharif blames US
ISLAMABAD : Blaming the Pakistan government for the killing of its chief Hakimullah Mehsud, Taliban have warned that it "will soon start targeting" the ruling PML-N leadership for its alleged support to the US in the region.
The Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan also announced that it would not hold any peace talks with the Nawaz Sharif government and threatened to avenge the killing of Hakimullah in a CIA-operated drone strike.
Geo News quoted an unnamed senior militant commander operating in Afghanistan as saying that they would soon start targeting the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) leadership for its alleged support to the US in the region.
TTP spokesman Shahidullah Shahid said the group's leadership knew that the government was not sincere in peace talks but had decided to hold negotiations "for the sake of the Pakistani people".
"We did not want innocent Pakistani people to suffer any more and therefore decided to hold negotiations with the government. But the government, by helping the US in the killing of Hakimullah Mehsud, proved that there was zero sincerity in the mind of the rulers. It was neither sincere nor serious in peace negotiations," the Taliban spokesman was quoted as saying by the report.
He warned the government would have to pay the price for, what he termed playing a double game with the TTP.
Shahidullah said Hakimullah's killing was a "huge loss" to the Taliban, adding they would always feel his absence.
"We are passing through a difficult phase and are still in the state of mourning. And that's the reason we could not sit to choose his successor," he remarked.
He said the TTP Shura would hold its meeting within the next few days and would choose the next Taliban leader.
When told about reports that the Shura had held its meeting in North Waziristan but could not develop consensus over one name, the Taliban spokesman said it was not true.
He said all the Shura members had been informed about the meeting and they would soon gather at a safe place to choose Hakimullah's successor.
US drone attacks violate Pakistan's sovereignty, PM Sharif says
The US drone campaign violates the sovereignty of Pakistan, which will not allow its national security policies to be determined by foreign powers, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif said today.
In his first public remarks after the killing of Pakistani Taliban chief Hakimullah Mehsud in a US drone attack on Friday, Sharif said the days when security policies were decided through "telephone calls from abroad" are over.
Without referring to the killing of the Taliban chief, Sharif said US drone strikes violate Pakistan?s sovereignty and international laws and are counter-productive to efforts to bring peace and stability to the country and the region.
"Gone are the days when our national security policies were determined through telephone calls from abroad.
We now have a democratically elected government, chosen by the people of Pakistan," he said in his address at a field exercise by the army in Punjab province.
"Pakistan is faced with serious challenges both within the country and at international level. But there is hope, a hope to rise through and meet these challenges," he told a gathering that included top military officers and army chief Gen Ashfaq Parvez Kayani.
Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan has blamed the US for deliberately sabotaging proposed peace talks with the Taliban by killing Mehsud. The government had begun contacts with the militants and a team of representatives was scheduled to meet the Taliban just before Mehsud was killed.
Sharif said his government is determined to end bloodshed and violence "but it cannot be done over-night, nor can it be done by unleashing senseless force against our citizens, without first making every effort to bring the misguided and confused elements of society back to the mainstream".
The government has to ensure that political parties, the military and civil society are on the same page to create an environment necessary to tackle this problem, he said.
Cheers
.
- and there's no danger of that at the moment.
Praise be to allaaah, after reading kooran the believers got enlightened and brought down the synagogue in 1980s. 