Pakistani Taliban in bitter feud over leadership

Society Pakistan & World Affairs
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The govt should exploit this feud and turn them against each other.

Pakistani Taliban in bitter feud over leadership | GulfNews.com

Islamabad: A bitter feud has broken among the Pakistani Taliban over who should take over the group’s leadership from Hakimullah Mehsud, who was killed in a US drone strike two weeks ago.

The post was due to go to Maulana Fazlullah, a ruthless mullah from Pakistan’s Swat Valley area who ordered the shooting of Malala Yousafzai, the schoolgirl blogger who spoke out against the Taliban.

But when he was officially confirmed in the position at a secret meeting of the Taliban’s high command last week, it sparked a walk-out by commanders from a rival faction. “When Fazlullah’s name was announced, they… walked out saying, ‘The Taliban’s command is doomed’,” said one Taliban figure who attended the meeting.

The argument over the succession has exposed long-running tensions within the Pakistani Taliban, who are in effect a loose conglomeration of some 30 different militia groups.

In recent years the movement has been dominated by the Mehsud tribe, with the recently-killed Hakimullah Mehsud having taken over the leadership from Baitullah Mehsud, who himself died in a drone strike in 2009.

Fazlullah, despite his reputation as a hardliner’s hardliner, is considered a relative outsider within the ranks, as he hails from the Swat Valley rather than the Taliban’s traditional strongholds in Pakistan’s tribally-administered region.

That is where one of the main other contenders for the leadership comes from - Khan Said, whose main previous responsibility has been recruiting and training suicide bombers.

“Mehsuds are not only not happy with this appointment, there are reports of serious infighting among them that might come to the fore in the near future,” said Saifullah Mahsud, director of the FATA Research Centre, a Pakistani think tank.

While a failure to agree on a new leader could compromise the group’s operation effectiveness, it could equally lead to even more bloodshed as different commanders and factions embark on their own rampages.

The group already stands accused of killing thousands of Pakistani civilians in recent years, as well as trying to impose sharia law in places like Swat. A fissuring of the command could also make it harder for the Pakistani government to press ahead with planned peace talks.

However, given that many of the Taliban leadership are either opposed to talks in principle, or are insistent that they will only lay down their weapons when the existing government is replaced by an Islamic caliphate, the chances of the peace talks leading to any meaningful agreement have always been in doubt.

Fazlullah has ruled out any dialogue and has announced a new campaign to attack government and security installations in the Punjab region, the political base of Nawaz Sharif, the prime minister.

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Re: Pakistani Taliban in bitter feud over leadership

Government has been claiming about their feuds for more than 5 years......nothing happened...

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Re: Pakistani Taliban in bitter feud over leadership

Not a good idea. Just eliminate them on the face of earth. These "maut ke saudagar" should face their suicidal fate what they have chosen for themselves.

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Re: Pakistani Taliban in bitter feud over leadership

Lets hope they send suicide bombers to kill each other. Hope they all die.

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^ :D I used to say that all the time.

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Re: Pakistani Taliban in bitter feud over leadership

^ ye bhi like banta hai ^_^

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Re: Pakistani Taliban in bitter feud over leadership

Violent Rift Deepens in Pakistan’s Taliban - WSJ.com

KARACHI, Pakistan—A deadly rift within Pakistan’s Taliban network has deepened since a U.S. drone strike killed the group’s chief this month, militants and officials said, with the late leader’s hard-line wing challenged by commanders interested in pursuing peace negotiations with the government.

**In recent weeks, members of these two factions of Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan have been killing each other, both in TTP’s main stronghold of North Waziristan on the Afghan border, and in the southern metropolis of Karachi, where vast urban neighborhoods are under effective Taliban control.The Shawal valley in Waziristan, in particular, has become a flashpoint.
**

**“Both sides have set up positions in the valley, and there have been exchanges of fire,” one TTP commander said.
**

The Pakistani government strongly condemned the Nov. 1 drone strike that killed Hakimullah Mehsud, saying it had been on the verge of opening peace talks with TTP. In reality, some Taliban commanders said, it was only members of TTP’s relatively more moderate faction that participated in that outreach. That faction is led by Khan Said, known as Sajna, the group’s leader in South Waziristan.

Both factions are largely made up of members of TTP’s backbone, the Mehsud tribe that dominates Waziristan. TTP’s new chief, Mullah Fazlullah, is its first leader who isn’t a Mehsud. Some leading TTP commanders are dismayed by his rise, militants and officials said.

“The charismatic leadership of Hakimullah Mehsud had kept the organization together, and Mullah Fazlullah doesn’t have that,” said Syed Hussain Shaheed Soherwordi, an international terrorism specialist at the University of Peshawar. “This is the first time that a certain difference of opinion has been expressed. When the leadership of a terrorist organization is contested by some of its members, that’s the moment when there will be some cracks within the organization.”

These cracks are likely to further radicalize the group as its rival factions “fight with each other, and all of them try to score points by having more subversive activities,” he said.

Mr. Said was initially tapped as Mr. Mehsud’s successor. At the subsequent gathering of Taliban leadership that chose Mr. Fazlullah, “Sajna did not say anything, he just kept quiet,” one person familiar with the meeting’s details said.

Since then, some Taliban militants said, Pakistani authorities seem to have been backing his faction, especially as internecine violence flared in Karachi’s Pashtun shantytowns.

“They want to eliminate the Hakimullah group in Karachi,” one midlevel commander said.

Pakistan’s Taliban network has always been a much looser organization than the older, more established, Afghan Taliban movement. The Pakistani Taliban gained strength after the 2001 U.S. invasion ousted the Afghan Taliban regime, prompting its leaders to seek refuge in Waziristan and other areas on the Pakistani side of the border.Although TTP acknowledges the overall spiritual authority of the Afghan Taliban leader, Mullah Omar, it pursues radically different policies, targeting the Pakistani army and state. Unlike the Afghan Taliban, TTP opposes polio vaccinations and frequently attacks religious minorities. It is also much closer to al Qaeda.

Pakistani Taliban spokesmen deny any rift within their movement. “This is the propaganda of the enemy,” said TTP spokesman Shahidullah Shahid.

Azam Tariq, the spokesman for Mr. Said, the leader in South Waziristan, also said all militants accept Mr. Fazlullah’s leadership.

**But midlevel and senior TTP commanders in Karachi and North Waziristan said the rivalry between Messrs. Said and Mehsud over strategy had emerged in the days before the assassination, with Mr. Said calling for a more pragmatic line.
**

**Heated disagreements over potential peace talks were the main topic at a gathering of top Taliban commanders just before Mr. Mehsud’s death, said a person close to the TTP who was in the area that day.
**

**“After Hakimullah was killed, people from the other faction distributed sweets in North Waziristan,” this person said.
**

Mr. Fazlullah has ruled out peace negotiations and promised revenge attacks against the Pakistani state. In recent months, he claimed some high-profile killings, including the assassination of a Pakistani army general overseeing the Swat valley north of Islamabad.

“Fazlullah has always been the one who was least diplomatic, very blunt in claiming credit for these acts of terrorism—never shying away from what he has done,” said retired Pakistani Army Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas.

**A senior TTP commander said many Mehsud tribesmen in Waziristan were perplexed that Mr. Fazlullah, who hails from Swat, operates out of Afghanistan’s faraway border provinces of Kunar and Nuristan.
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**“Fazlullah has never visited Waziristan, and doesn’t seem to have plans to visit in the future, either. We don’t have easy access to him to discuss issues closely,” the commander said. “Many people are upset with his leadership. There is a possibility that a new faction will be created by those who oppose it.”
**

—Habib Khan Totakhil in Kabul and Saeed Shah in Islamabad contributed to this article.

Write to Yaroslav Trofimov at [EMAIL=“[email protected]”][email protected]

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Re: Pakistani Taliban in bitter feud over leadership

So Altaf bhaaai was right that karachi (part of it anyway) have become strongholds of TTP? :eek:

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lagta hay aapki sun li hay…for a change TTP is getting the same medicine they have been prescribing to others for a long time.

**VOA DEEWA **‏@voadeewa](https://twitter.com/voadeewa)3m
News Alert: A suicide attacker kills Saifuddin, ttp](https://twitter.com/search?q=%23TTP&src=hash) chief for #FRBannu](https://twitter.com/search?q=%23FRBannu&src=hash) at #Muski](https://twitter.com/search?q=%23Muski&src=hash) near #MirAli](https://twitter.com/search?q=%23MirAli&src=hash) (N.Waiziristan- A sign of tension within TTP.

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Who reports TTP’s confidential news?

I agree with ehsan bhai :k:

Unfortunately we have thousands of TTP sympathisers, met one guy yesterday who justified killing of innocent people by TTP.

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Re: Pakistani Taliban in bitter feud over leadership

Did you invite him to strap a suicide vest to his body and do what he deemed as "justified"?

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Believe it not, he said he'll do the deed if given a chance. It's no surprise in a country where thousands came out to attend Osama bin Laden's ghaibana namaz-e-janaza,

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Please tell him to start it from the people he calls parents, sisters and brothers. Start it from those who fed him when he did not know how to tell that he was hungry. Start from those who taught him how to walk. And start from those teachers who taught him how to justify things.

And tell him that you will pray to God to admit you to the deepest hole in hell.

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Well said :k:

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BBC News - Pakistan bomb: Seven Taliban killed in North Waziristan

Pakistan bomb: Seven Taliban killed in North Waziristan

At least seven Pakistani Taliban militants have been killed in a suicide attack in a tribal area near the Afghan border, intelligence officials say.

A local Taliban commander, Qari Saifuddin, was among those reported killed in the car bombing in North Waziristan, a militant stronghold.

It is unclear who was behind the attack near the town of Mir Ali.

Correspondents say the blast comes amid rifts in the Pakistani Taliban and other militant groups in the area.

Last month Pakistan Taliban leader Hakimullah Mehsud was killed in a US drone strike in North Waziristan.

Qari Saifuddin was travelling in a double-cabin pick-up truck with seven others when an explosives-laden Toyota station wagon rammed into it, reports said.

They were taken to a hospital in Mir Ali where he and at least six of his companions were pronounced dead.

Qari Saifuddin was named by officials as the mastermind of the high-profile abduction of at least 80 students and staff from Razmak Cadet College in North Waziristan in June 2009.

The hostages were freed a day later, reportedly after negotiations.

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Re: Pakistani Taliban in bitter feud over leadership

Khas kam jahan Pak

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Re: Pakistani Taliban in bitter feud over leadership

This is an interesting article, assuming what it claims is true. Are the groups within the Taliban just fighting only over who the figurehead should be or is it a fight over what course of action the figurehead will take? Will the change in the leadership affect their stance and their conduct? Will it stop the suicide attacks, their threats, and their murderous attacks on people? The answer to these questions would indeed be what could potentially mean something significant for the people affected by their actions and beliefs. If their fighting is an internal power struggle and they continue their attacks on innocent people then they should be eradicated.

Haroon Ahmad
DET – U.S. Central Command
www.facebook.com/centcomurdu

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It would help if the murderer (Fazlullah) hiding or more to the point living in Afghanistan is “found” by the Americans and droned. Wonder why a guy living in an area which is under your control cannot be found by your security services yet they can find others on the Pakistani side quite easily.

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The head gets huge amount of money from some of our closest friends, hence competition.