Last week, the government of Pakistan imposed emergency rule and governor’s rule in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP). The Pashtun-majority province, which shares a long border with Afghanistan, has been deeply shaped by events across the frontier.

KP’s instability escalated during the 1980s, when Gen Ziaul Haq’s dictatorship, backed by American and Saudi funding, transformed Pakistan into a launching pad for anti-Soviet Afghan Islamist insurgents. After the Soviet withdrawal in 1988, Pakistan aligned with the Afghan Taliban (TTA), who took power in Kabul in 1996. Even after the US forces ousted the TTA in 2001, Pakistan provided TTA fighters sanctuary to counter the new regime in Kabul installed by the US.

In 2007, the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) emerged. While the TTA maintained ties with Pakistan’s security establishment, they also cultivated ideological links with the TTP. However, the TTA remained passive as the TTP carried out brutal attacks inside Pakistan.

Despite a major Pakistani military offensive (2015–2017) that displaced the TTP, Pakistan maintained the belief that the TTA were ‘good Taliban’ who would remain allies once in power. TTP became the ‘bad Taliban.’ The strategy was as juvenile as it sounds. Under the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI), the government began resettling TTP fighters who had escaped to Afghanistan. There was no serious bar on them retaining their weapons and regrouping. This was yet another juvenile move by the state and its then-favourite government.

Decades of contradictory policies towards the Afghan and Pakistani Taliban have left Khyber Pakhtunkhwa mired in insecurity. As the state imposes emergency rule in KP, the question is whether extraordinary powers can help correct the state’s longstanding strategic failures

Decades of contradictory policies towards the Afghan and Pakistani Taliban have left Khyber Pakhtunkhwa mired in insecurity. As the state imposes emergency rule in KP, the question is whether extraordinary powers can help correct the state’s longstanding strategic failures

Understandably, during the TTA’s return to power in........

© Dawn (Magazines)