Asia Pacific Pakistan Urges Afghans to Help Find Taliban Leaders Behind Massacre By ISMAIL KHAN and AZAM AHMED DEC. 17, 2014 PESHAWAR, Pakistan — Pakistan’s army and intelligence chiefs traveled to Afghanistan on Wednesday to seek help locating the Pakistani Taliban commanders responsible for the massacre of students at a school here in Peshawar the day before, officials said. The trip, by Gen. Raheel Sharif and Lt. Gen. Rizwan Akhtar, the head of the Inter-Services Intelligence spy agency, was described by officials of both countries as an effort to find common ground. The two neighbors have for years had an uneasy relationship, and tensions have frequently flared over cross-border attacks by militants — although usually ones on Afghan soil by militants sheltering in Pakistan. In particular, the Pakistani military’s history of support for the Afghan Taliban has long been an irritant for Afghan officials. But Pakistani officials have been increasingly assertive about protesting operations by Afghan-based militants. And after the school attack, in which 132 of the 148 people killed by a group of Taliban gunmen were young students, officials were quick to blame Afghan-based elements of the Pakistani Taliban, also known as Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan.A senior security official here, speaking on the condition of anonymity before the meeting in Kabul on Wednesday, said Pakistan possessed hard evidence that Taliban commanders hiding on Afghan soil had coordinated Tuesday’s attack. “The intel monitored the conversation between the attackers and their handler, who was across the border during the siege,” the official said. “The chief will be demanding action.” During a lengthy meeting at the Afghan presidential palace, the Pakistani officials shared intelligence with President Ashraf Ghani and the top American military commander Gen. John F. Campbell, officials said. Mr. Ghani condemned the attack on the school and likened it to recent assaults in Afghanistan, including a bombing in the country’s southeast that killed 61 people, and a suicide attack at a French-funded school in Kabul. A statement from the palace said the two countries had agreed on increased mutual cooperation in fighting extremism, offering a glimmer of hope that some positive step could be taken. But in Washington, White House officials expressed concerns on Wednesday that relations between Pakistan and Afghanistan, which had seemed to warm since Mr. Ghani’s election, were suddenly at risk of worsening again. Pakistani officials and others have contended that the leader of the Pakistani Taliban, Maulana Fazlullah, is hiding in the mountainous eastern Afghan provinces of Kunar and Nuristan. Last year, Afghan officials admitted to helping Mr. Fazlullah, largely as payback for Pakistani support for the Afghan Taliban. Still, relations between the two countries have visibly warmed since September, when Mr. Ghani came to office, and in recent weeks some reports have suggested that American airstrikes in Afghanistan had targeted Pakistani Taliban leaders. One element of Pakistan’s militant problem, however, lies within — namely the military’s history of favoring some Islamist groups, generally focused on operations against India and Afghanistan, while fighting others. Here in Peshawar, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif insisted that the policy would end. “We announce that there will be no differentiation between ‘good’ and ‘bad’ Taliban,” he said. The Pakistani Taliban, for their part, named the commander responsible for the attack as Omar Mansoor, the Taliban commander for Peshawar and Darra Adam Khel, a nearby tribal district known for its gunsmiths. In a statement on Wednesday, the militants released photos that showed six men, described as the attackers, wearing military fatigues and gripping assault rifles, standing alongside Mr. Mansoor. A Taliban spokesman, Muhammad Khurasani, warned of further attacks unless the army ceased a six-month-old offensive against militants in the North Waziristan tribal district. The spokesman said the school had been selected for attack because it served children of military personnel. “Our shura decided to target these enemies of Islam right in their homes so they can feel the pain of losing their children,” he said. Pakistani security officials here initially reported that there were nine attackers on Tuesday, but on Wednesday they dropped that figure to seven. Pakistan’s leaders spent the early part of the day grieving for those killed on Tuesday. Before traveling to Kabul, General Sharif attended a service for victims at the army headquarters in Peshawar. Prime Minister Sharif, who held a meeting with opposition political leaders in the city, announced that he was lifting a moratorium on the death penalty that has been in place since 2008. Sitting grim-faced beside the prime minister was Imran Khan, the opposition leader who has spent the past four months trying to oust Mr. Sharif over vote-rigging accusations. In response to the crisis, Mr. Khan has agreed to suspend his street campaign. Correction: December 17, 2014 Because of an editing error, an earlier version of this article misidentified the Pakistani official who said the differentiation between “good” and “bad” Taliban would end. It was Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, not Gen. Raheel Sharif. Ismail Khan reported from Peshawar, and Azam Ahmed from Kabul, Afghanistan. Eric Schmitt contributed reporting from Washington, and Declan Walsh from London.
Posted on: Thu, 18 Dec 2014 01:52:56 +0000
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