ISLAMABAD: Weeks of infi-ghting between Taliban groups have hampered stop-start peace talks with Pakistan’s government, sources said yesterday, as the insurgents’ leader vowed to continue fighting until Islamic law was enforced in the country.
Two factions of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), the umbrella grouping for disparate militant groups, have been locked in bloody clashes since at least March. The fighting has claimed more than 90 lives in the tribal areas along the Afghan border and has now forced the TTP’s commander-in-chief Mullah Fazlullah to appoint a mediator to try to end the feud, militant sources said.
“The infighting has forced the Taliban leadership to postpone peace talks for the time being,” a TTP insider said on condition of anonymity.
Another Taliban commander in the northwest confirmed that “peace talks have been halted until end of differences between the two rival groups”.
The development threatens to undermine what little progress has been made in the peace negotiations.
The government of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif began the talks in February to try to end the TTP’s seven-year insurgency which has claimed thousands of lives. Insiders say the TTP feud, which came to light in March, is over command in the South Waziristan tribal area and who has the right to lead the Mehsud tribe, from which the movement draws many of its members.
The conflict pits followers of the late TTP leader Hakimullah Mehsud, led by commander Sheheryar Mehsud, against supporters of Khan Said Sajna.
Fazlullah, who became TTP chief on Hakimullah’s death, has separately vowed to continue his armed struggle until Sharia law is in force across Pakistan. AFP
