US designates 4 Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan members as global terrorists
Dec 03, 2022
Washington [US] December 3 : The United States declared four leaders of Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), also known as Pakistani Taliban, as global terrorists on December 1, Thursday.
The US added that it would use all its srength and resources to bring them to justice, The Dawn reported quoting a source from Pakistan.
The Dawn report further quoted the US State Department as saying, "The United States is committed to using its full set of counterterrorism tools to counter the threat posed by terrorist groups operating in Afghanistan."
"The actions demonstrate that we will continue to use all relevant tools to uphold our commitment to see to it that international terrorists are not able to operate with impunity in Afghanistan," The Dawn reported, quoting the US State Department.
Further, according to a statement by the US State Department, the TTP and the Asian Al Qaeda have been using Afghanistan for spreading terror.
The TTP's deputy emir Qari Amjad is one of the four leaders to have been added to the US' designated list of terrorists, the statement said, adding that he is responsible for looking after the TTP's militants and operations in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan.
The others added as global terrorists in the US list are Osama Mehmood, a regional chief of Al Qaeda, Atif Yahya Ghouri and Mohammad Maruf, who is in charge of the recruitment of terrorists in Al Qaeda, The Dawn reported.
Amjad, who also goes by the alias Mufti Hazrat Deroji, has been involved in violent terrorist activities for the last 15 years in Pakistan and has been even more brutal since the Taliban came to power in Afghanistan, the report said.
Further quoting the US State Department, The Dawn reported that they were added to the list for the high leadership roles that they serve in these terrorist groups and, adding them to the list is one of the US's efforts to ensure that Afghan soil isn't used as a terror launchpad.
As a result of them being added to the US list, any and all property and financial support that comes under the US' jurisdiction are blocked, The Dawn reported.
The Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan formally withdrew its ceasefire agreement with Pakistan, which was formally declared in June, on November 28.
The withdrawal of the ceasefire agreement was followed by a wave of terror attacks in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan.
The TTP has, till date, claimed responsibility for carrying out 43 attacks in 18 districts of Pakistan, saying most was either in retaliation or in defence, according to a report.
