Pakistan security forces killed 22 terrorists belonging to the banned Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) in an intelligence-based operation in northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, the army said on Tuesday.
Security forces conducted the operation on Monday, based on the intelligence report on the presence of terrorists in Bannu district bordering north Waziristan, a statement issued by the army’s Inter-Services Public Relations said. “During the conduct of the operation, the troops effectively engaged the khawarij location and after an intense fire exchange, 22 khawarij were killed,” it said.
Fitna al Khawarij is a term the state uses for terrorists belonging to the TTP. It added that a sanitisation operation was being conducted to eliminate any other terrorists in the area. The ISPR also said that the counter-terrorism campaign by security forces and law enforcement agencies would continue at “full pace” to “wipe out” the menace of terrorism from the country.
Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif praised the security forces for the successful operation, saying that they were achieving “major successes” against terrorism. “The entire nation stands with Pakistan’s armed forces in the war against terrorism,” Sharif said. “We are determined to completely eradicate all kinds of terrorism from the country.”
Pakistan has witnessed an uptick in terror activities, especially in KPK and Balochistan, after the TTP ended its ceasefire with the government in November 2022. The latest in the string of terror incidents is a suicide attack on the Federal Constabulary’s (FC) headquarters in Peshawar on Monday morning, in which three FC men were killed and 12 injured.
Inspector General of Police Khyber Pakhthunkhwa Zulfiqar Hameed said on Tuesday that authorities have identified the location where the terrorists spent the night before the suicide attack. Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmail Baghaei said in his weekly briefing. He said the meeting will be held at the deputy ministerial level.
Under a 2015 deal designed to cap Iran’s nuclear activities, Iran agreed to tough restrictions on its international programme in exchange for an easing of sanctions. The deal began to unravel in 2018, when the United States pulled out of it and began to reimpose certain sanctions. European countries have recently threatened to trigger the 2015 deal’s “snapback” mechanism, which would allow sanctions to be reimposed in the case of non-compliance by Tehran.
German Foreign Ministry spokesperson Martin Giese, asked who Germany will send to the talks and what its expectations are, said that “the talks are taking place at expert level”. “Iran must never come into possession of a nuclear weapon,” so Germany, France and Britain are “continuing to work. At high pressure on a sustainable and verifiable diplomatic solution to the Iranian nuclear programme,” he said.