PESHAWAR: Concerns are growing as Pakistan authorities claimed that Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) members involved in extortion cases enjoying safe heavens in Afghanistan.
Addressing a press conference in the provincial capital, DIG Counter Terrorism Department (CTD), Imran Shahid, they recently apprehended two Afghan nationals linked to the banned Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), which Pakistan claims has established safe havens in Afghanistan. “Zaman Faiz and Saeedullah, both Afghan citizens, were apprehended in Lahore, and their mobile phones have been confiscated,” he revealed.
He said that the issue will be take up with Kabul t Afghan citizens have been engaged in acts of terrorism, extortion, and other unlawful activities within Pakistan.
These extortionists targeted businessmen, politicians, and other individuals who refrained from reporting to local authorities due to fear. “The arrested individuals were operating in the Mohmand district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, with 71 other accomplices. This network even contacted politicians, including a senator and a member of the provincial assembly, demanding extortion money.”
TTP Involvement in Extortion
The CTD official disclosed that the arrested TTP members had also created ten WhatsApp groups related to extortion. The banned TTP suffered significant losses during military operations in 2014, following a brazen attack on the Army Public School in Peshawar that claimed the lives of nearly 150 individuals, mostly students.
The TTP members largely fled to Afghanistan, where they were pursued by US-led forces. However, with Afghanistan now under Taliban control, Pakistan contends that it has become a “safe haven” for TTP terrorists involved in attacks on military personnel.
