Peshawar: Pakistan(PAK) Taliban’s previous reunification of different breakaway factions going to pose threats to projects related to China’s Belt & Road Initiative (BRI) in north-western Pakistan(PAK) & create internal security problems within the area, as per analysts.
The previous development (devt) has resulted in issues about the safety & security of Chinese nationals & projects, an Islamabad-based security officer informed the Nikkei Asian Review on condition of anonymity.
“In Khyber Pakhtunkhwa area’s different remote regions, multiple Chinese development (devt) projects, mostly within the ground of hydro-electricity generation & infra-structure, are going on. The Pakistan(PAK) Taliban’s previous reunification has rised issues regarding the safety of Chinese nationals & projects,” the officer said.
The 3 main factions of Pakistan(PAK) Taliban (or) the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan(PAK) (TTP) have been Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, the Hizb ul-Ahrar & Hakeemullah Mehsud crowd. They’d split in 2014 because of command problems. Although, it has been declared that the factions have been coming back together past month & have been also joined by a faction of Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, a banned terror crowd functioning in Balochistan area.
From its formation in 2007, the TTP, a powerful ally of al-Qaeda, had become an umbrella organisation for terror teams & was engaged in multiple terror targets.
The TTP’s initial footprints have been in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa area & in semi-autonomous tribal regions bordering Afghanistan. Although, the crowd thereafter expanded its presence in different parts of the nation however have been countered in a military operation in 2014, enforcing the crowd to take (2) sanctuary over the border in Afghanistan after its command & curb structure has been shattered in tribal regions.
As per analysts, multiple TTP splinter teams recognised they’d no longer be viable alone in a modifying political scenario in Afghanistan. To honor its dedication to block harboring foreign terrorists, the Afghan Taliban won’t be able to shelter the TTP anymore.
“The self-realisation of the threats for its survival within the modifying political landscape of Afghanistan, & afterwards possible pressures from that Afghan Taliban, can have performed a extra substantial character behind this procedure of reunification,” Abdul Sayed, a Sweden-based researcher on jihadi teams in Pakistan(PAK) & Afghanistan, informed Nikkei Asian Review.
The TTP’s reunification has put China in a tight location, given the truth that they have been pressing Pakistan(PAK) to crack down on ethnic separatist teams in Balochistan & Sindh because of projects related to the China-Pakistan(PAK) Economic Corridor (CPEC), that is a part of the BRI.
Chinese businesses in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa are engaged in numerous infra-structure & energy projects involving the Karakoram Highway Stage II. The Suki Kinari Hydropower Station & the Havelian Dry Port lie along the highway, that ends in the Khunjerab Pass in Gilgit-Baltistan. It afterwards become China Domestic Highway 314 after crossing the border, leading to Urumqi, the capital of Xinjiang area in north-western China.
“The TTP frequently problems elaborated affirmations over the China state, condemning the status faced by Chinese Muslims in their own own nation. Extra importantly, targetting CPEC projects could create serious economic issues for the Pakistani state — destabilising it’s the ultimate goal of TTP & its allied anti-state jihadists,” Sayed stated.
In China’s appeal, Pakistan(PAK) in 2013 had banned 3 terror teams related to al-Qaeda — the East Turkestan Islamic Movement, the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, & the Islamic Jihad Union. Beijing believed these teams had well-established sanctuaries in tribal regions of Pakistan(PAK) with TTP’s support.
Awhile China has been originally less of a worry for the TTP than American & Pakistani security enforces, some of the transitional stars functioning in Pakistan(PAK)’s tribal regions have encouraged the crowd to focus Chinese projects as retaliation for mistreatment of Uyghur Muslims by this Chinese govt, analysts stated.
The TTP has already died & kidnapped multiple Chinese nationals in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa & Balochistan. As the TTP reunites, Pakistani security enforces were deployed to protect the Chinese present within the area, as per security authorities.
“The TTP’s reunification could pose a danger in some of the dists of Punjab(PB), Balochistan & Khyber Pakhtunkhwa as the terror crowd has networks in these regions,” Muhammad Amir Rana, director of the Pakistan(PAK) Institute for Peace Studies (PIPS), an Islamabad-based think tank, informed Nikkei Asian Review.
As per a PIPS record, TTP & its splinter teams carried out 97 terror targets in 2019, mostly in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Punjab(PB) & Balochistan, that said 209 lives.