After its formation in 2007, Pakistan fell in a period of terrible violence. (file)
Peshawar:
A top leader of the Pakistan Taliban narrowly escaped a suspected drone attack on a safe house in eastern Afghanistan, the militant group said on Friday.
The strike on Thursday evening came a week after a ceasefire between the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and the government, with militants accusing Islamabad of killing its fighters.
The TTP – a separate movement but shared roots with Afghanistan’s new leaders – plunged Pakistan into a period of fierce violence since its formation in 2007.
Two TTP sources currently in Afghanistan told AFP news agency cleric Fakir Mohamed was in what was described as a drone attack on a compound in Chaugam village in Kunar, the eastern province bordering Pakistan.
A source said, “Maulvi Fakir Mohammad was not present at that time… Two Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan fighters were injured.”
He said Pakistan’s TTP fighters were crossing the border with Afghanistan and using the compound as a hideout.
Mohamed was arrested by the previous US-backed Kabul government and spent years in Afghanistan’s infamous Bagram prison, but was released in August following the Taliban’s takeover of power.
It was unclear who was responsible for Thursday’s attack, but both Pakistan and the United States have previously used unmanned aerial vehicles to carry out killings in the region.
Afghan Taliban spokesman Bilal Karimi told AFP from Kabul that the attack was an explosive fired from the ground.
The TTP emerged 14 years ago and has been accused of nearly 70,000 murders by successive Pakistani governments.
Thursday marks the seventh anniversary of the TTP massacre of nearly 150 school children in Peshawar, an atrocity that has engulfed Pakistan’s national consciousness.
This prompted a 2014 crackdown by the military that crushed the movement and forced its radical Islamist fighters to hide in Afghanistan.
After the victory of Taliban in Afghanistan, Pakistan is now trying to prevent the withdrawal of TTP.
(Except for the title, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
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