Current Final

Tag: Taliban

  • Pakistan kills 331 Taliban militants in cross-border operation in Afghanistan

    Pakistan kills 331 Taliban militants in cross-border operation in Afghanistan

    Pakistan said on Saturday that its forces have killed 331 Taliban militants in a military operation launched after what Pakistan described as unprovoked cross-border attacks from Afghanistan. The operation, named “Operation Ghazab-lil-Haq,” began on Friday after clashes along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border escalated further. 

    Information Minister Attaullah Tarar posted a statement on X, saying that, at least 331 Afghan Taliban, Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) fighters, and other militants had been killed, with more than 500 wounded. 

    He added that Pakistani forces have destroyed 104 Taliban posts, captured 22, and disabled 163 tanks and armoured personnel carriers. Air strikes were carried out at 37 locations inside Afghanistan, he said.

    Pakistani officials said the operation targeted armed groups aligned with the Afghan Taliban, whom Pakistan accuses of launching repeated cross-border attacks. Fighting continued overnight as Pakistani ground and air forces maintained operations across multiple sectors.

    Security sources reported that the Pakistan Air Force struck brigade and battalion headquarters linked to Afghan Taliban forces in Nangarhar province. Pakistani troops captured and demolished the New Afghan 8 post, while another position in the Noshki sector was destroyed.

    Through updates issued overnight and on Saturday, security sources said Pakistani forces were conducting “decisive operations” in response to what they described as unprovoked aggression by the Afghan Taliban regime. 

    “Air strikes in Kandahar targeted and destroyed an Afghan army headquarters”,  security sources said . The Pakistan Air Force also hit two objectives at the Mohmand Dara base in Nangarhar province.

    In other sectors, Pakistani forces carried out targeted operations. In Chitral’s Kandaksi base sector, an Afghan Taliban position was hit. In the Khyber sector, Taliban posts and camps were destroyed, including the Khyber post.

    In the Noshki sector, a Taliban post was successfully targeted and destroyed. In Qila Saifullah, the Rahim Thana post was destroyed, while an infiltration attempt was also foiled, killing multiple militants.

  • Taliban delegation visits Japan in rare trip outside region

    Taliban delegation visits Japan in rare trip outside region

    A Taliban government delegation was visiting Japan for the first time on Monday, in a rare diplomatic visit outside of the region.

    The Afghan delegation left Kabul on Saturday, in a visit that local media said would last one week and included officials from the higher education, foreign affairs, and economy ministries.

    “We seek dignified interaction with the world for a strong, united, advanced, prosperous, developed Afghanistan and to be an active member of the international community,” Latif Nazari, a deputy minister at the ministry of economy who is part of the delegation, tweeted on Saturday.

    The Taliban government makes regular visits to neighbouring and regional countries, including in Central Asia, Russia and China.

    However, it has only officially visited Europe for diplomacy summits in Norway in 2022 and 2023.

    Japan’s embassy in Kabul temporarily relocated to Qatar after the fall of the previous foreign-backed government and the takeover by the Taliban in 2021.

    But it has since reopened and resumed diplomatic and humanitarian activities in the country.

    The Afghan delegation plans to “exchange views with Japanese government officials during their stay”, Japan’s public broadcaster NHK reported, citing unnamed Afghan diplomatic sources.

    Japan’s foreign ministry could not immediately comment on the visit when contacted by AFP.

  • Taliban have taken control of my constituency: Sher Afzal Marwat

    Taliban have taken control of my constituency: Sher Afzal Marwat

    Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) leader Sher Afzal Khan Marwat on Tuesday dismissed claims that terrorist organisation Tehreek-e Taliban Pakistan (TTP) were not present in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) province, where his party holds power.

    Speaking on the floor of the National Assembly, the lawmaker said, “I cannot return to my constituency because the Taliban have taken control there, and many other districts share the same problem.”

    He also highlighted that the province is engulfed in unrest, and inflation is increasing.

    Recalling the claims of Defence Minister Khawaja Asif that PTI should make the first move for negotiation, Marwat emphasised that political parties must rest aside their egos.

    PTI leader called on Rana Sanaullah to share the government’s official stance on holding dialogue with PTI, adding that all stakeholders must sit together and find a solution to the polarised situation in the country.

    On December 6, imprisoned former prime minister Imran Khan, in a message on X (formerly Twitter) had said that he had formed a five-member negotiation committee comprising Opposition Leader in the National Assembly Omar Ayub Khan, CM KP Ali Amin Gandapur, Chief Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC) Sahibzada Hamid Raza, lawyer Salman Akram Raja and former NA Speaker Asad Qaiser.

    The founder of Pakistan’s biggest opposition party had also announced that if two demands, including the formation of a judicial commission to investigate the May 9 and November 26 events and the release of the political prisoner, remain unmet, the “civil disobedience movement” will follow.

    On the floor of NA, Rana Sanaullah noted that six weeks ago, PM Shehbaz Sharif went straight to the opposition members and shook hands with them, adding that Shehbaz Sharif announced that the government was ready to hold negotiations with the opposition on every matter. However, lawmaker Omer Ayub Khan responded using harsh words.

    Sanaullah also stressed that the parliamentary democratic system cannot work until the opposition leader and leader of the house don’t sit and have a dialogue.

    “For the first time, a pleasant breeze came from the opposition […] but talks cannot be held at gunpoint,” Khawaja Asif responded to Marwat on the same floor.

    The minister reiterated that the repeated attacks on Islamabad and calls for civil disobedience movement will not pave the way for negotiations. 

    “The nation is suffering losses in our political war,” he said, stressing the need for “a change that would create a good environment.”

    Khawaja Asif recalled the Parachinar incident by saying that, as per the constitution, it was the responsibility of the provincial government to solve the disputes between the two clans in the Kurram district, adding that the KP government prioritised last month’s protest march towards the federal capital instead of solving the Kurram land dispute.

  • Bannu Aman jirga demands end to ‘Good Taliban’

    Bannu Aman jirga demands end to ‘Good Taliban’

    As the Bannu Aman (Peace) Jirga, a traditional assembly of elders, concluded their meeting at the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Chief Minister’s house, the issue of ‘good Taliban’ – the militants who have surrendered to the security forces – came to the forefront.

    One of the jirga’s key demands was the “elimination of both the good and bad Taliban and their centres.”

    The Jirga also sought to end the Good Taliban’s patrols and pickets in the area. Dawn News reported that the presence of these militants and the Jirga’s demand to end them will be challenging for both the provincial and federal governments.

    On Sunday, CM Gandapur issued a video message on social media stating that he had pointed out at the first meeting of the apex committee that “some armed men—posing as government officials or claiming to represent government agencies—were roaming the area and interfering in government affairs.”

    Gandapur said that he has ordered the police to arrest such individuals immediately.

  • TTP launches Azm-e-Shariat as retaliation to Pakistan’s Azm-e-Istehkam

    TTP launches Azm-e-Shariat as retaliation to Pakistan’s Azm-e-Istehkam

    Following the government’s announcement of launching the new security operation Azm-e-Istehkam, a counter-terrorism campaign against the Tehreek-e-Taliban (TTP), the terrorist organisation has also announced its own retaliatory operation Azm-e-Shariat, the Khorasan Diary reported.

    Earlier this week, journalist Iftikhar Firdous raised alarms over the “clarity of policy” that the TTP holds against a confused and ambiguous state policy while appearing in Geo News programme Jirga with Saleem Safi.

    “The war against the Taliban has transformed; it has become ideological. TTP has started talking to political parties as they are expanding their political legitimacy by making a political office in Pakistan. Sarbakaf Mohmand, an affiliate of Jamaat-ul-Ahrar (JuA), was appointed as the political commission head,” cautioned the journalist.

    The Current contacted Iftikhar, the founding editor of the digital news organisation Khorasan Diary, to ask about the consequences of TTP having a clear ideology and garnering legitimacy.

    “Legitimising them even as a stakeholder has ramifications for the state. What happened during the peace talks gave them a voice, and since then, they have expanded that voice to overlap with the political narratives of the country,” said Firdous.

    He pointed out that since their narrative post-2021 is primarily anti-military and blames political governments of corruption and elitism,
    “any voice that chimes the same cord is used by them to promote their narrative. Their propaganda has been directly relevant to the political situation of current Pakistan.”

    About Azm-e-Istehkam, he said, “It has been clarified now that Azm e Istihkam is not the name of kinetics but rather the real-time implementation of the 14 points of the revised national action plan.”

  • Unidentified militants attack girls’ school in KP’s Kurram district

    Unidentified militants attack girls’ school in KP’s Kurram district

    Unidentified militants blew up a girls’ school in the Kurram district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP), Express News reported on Saturday.

    The local authorities confirmed that militants used hand grenades to destroy the Aisha Siddiqa Girls’ School, located in Central Kurram district. The powerful explosion destroyed the school building.

    No causalities have been reported.

    Relevant authorities, including intelligence agencies and police officials, are investigating the incident to arrest the terrorists responsible for the attack.
    Multiple girls’ schools had been attacked in North Waziristan. One of the locals has revealed to news outlets that the Taliban are demanding a significant amount of money from the schools’ funds.

  • Kabul to cooperate with Pakistan in probing Bisham terror attack

    Kabul to cooperate with Pakistan in probing Bisham terror attack

    The Foreign Office of Pakistan on Friday stated that Taliban authorities in Afghanistan had assured Pakistan of their cooperation in the investigation into the Bisham suicide attack in which five Chinese nationals and their Pakistani driver were killed.

    “The Afghan side has agreed to examine the findings of the investigation and to work with Pakistan to take the investigation to its logical conclusion,” said the FO spokesperson Mumtaz Zahra Baloch in a press briefing.

    This development came after the visit of a high-level delegation led by Interior Secretary Khurram Agha to Kabul.

    China also welcomed the progress in the investigation and urged Pakistani authorities to bring the perpetrators to justice.

    In recent years, tensions between Afghanistan and Pakistan have flared up as Pakistan blames Afghanistan for letting their territory be used by TTP against Pakistan.

  • Militants blow up first private school in North Waziristan

    Militants blow up first private school in North Waziristan

    A private girls’ school called Afia Islamic Girls Public School was blown up by unidentified militants in Tehsil Shewa of North Waziristan district on Wednesday night, reports Dawn.


    The police said the militants first assaulted the school watchman and later blew up two rooms of the school. There was, however, no loss of life in the explosion.


    Locals say that it was the only private girls’ school in the area and its administration had received multiple threat letters in the past.


    Journalist Iftikhar Firdous wrote on X (formerly Twitter) that he was contacted by the owner of the school and was told how the school was formed after going against the tide and now it is destroyed. Firdous wrote, “He was emotional so I asked him to share what he felt in his own words.”


    As government schools are “non-functional”, private schools are playing their part in promoting education. “In North Waziristan, the private sector plays an important role in promoting boys’ education, but there was no private girls’ school present in the area”.


    The owner deliberated with the elders of the region because he was determined to promote girls’ education. “For the construction of a private school for girls in Tehsil Shewa, we contacted different people, but no one was ready to build a school for girls because they said that the Taliban would destroy it since they are against female education, and we are not ready to invest in girls’ education in our area.”


    The owner convinced his friend, working as a laborer in the UAE, to invest Rs 10 lacs into the construction of a girls’ school in Tehsil Shewa, North Waziristan, as it would help promote girls’ education in the area. “He readily agreed with our advice and was ready to invest money in the girls’ school.” The owner related that the funds were not enough and so it took three years for completion. It was inaugurated on May 19, 2023. “In less than one year, 100 girls got admission to Afia School, and with every passing day, the strength of the school increased,” he told Firdous in an emotional tone.


    On May 9, 2024, at midnight 1 PM, unknown persons destroyed the school with a bomb, while also breaking chairs and whiteboards.


    Firdous shared how he ended the note determined to promote the cause he believes in.“In this way, they stopped our girls from education, but we will continue our struggle for the promotion of girls’ education until death”.

  • Several dead in protests in eastern Afghanistan

    Several dead in protests in eastern Afghanistan

    Several people were killed when a demonstration broke out in eastern Afghanistan on Thursday after Taliban authorities ordered houses cleared to make way for a building construction, a provincial official said.

    The Taliban authorities had ordered residents to vacate the land on the road between provincial capital Jalalabad and the border with Pakistan to make way for a new customs building, said Arafat Mohajer, the head of the information and culture department for the Torkham border point.

    “The residents of the area created chaos in response,” said Mohajer, and in clashes one Taliban official was killed as well as “a number of people who were occupying the land (illegally)”.

    The demonstration and clashes had blocked the key road from Jalalabad to Torkham, Mohajer added.

  • ‘Taliban has taken over most of KP areas’ claims Mohsin Dawar

    ‘Taliban has taken over most of KP areas’ claims Mohsin Dawar

    Mohsin Dawar, former MNA and political rights activist, recently claimed that “Taliban have taken over most of the areas in KP.”

    Dawar appeared on journalist Azaz Syed’s YouTube channel and remarked, “North Waziristan, Bannu, Lakki Marwat, Dera Ismail Khan, Tank and South Waziristan are almost completely taken over by them [Taliban].”

    Dawar also said that even big cities like Peshawar are not safe anymore.

    When Azaz Syed asked if he was talking about Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) specifically, Mohsin Dawar replied, “There are many groups involved but the majority is TTP that has occupied these areas.”

    When the journalist dug further into the former minister’s big claim, Dawar stated “This is not a claim but a reality. You yourself reported on the issue of abduction of session judge from DI Khan by TTP.”

    Dawar was referring to the Sessions Judge Shakirullah Marwat, who was abducted by TTP members on Dera Ismail Khan’s Tank Road and later released. KP government allegedly paid Rs 5 crore to TTP for his release.