Flashpoints | Security | South Asia

Why the TTP Remains the Central Fault Line Between Pakistan and Afghanistan 

The costs of confrontation are not confined to the security domain; it’s impacting every facet of the bilateral relationship. 

On October 11, Pakistan’s military reported that security forces had killed 12 militants and Afghan Taliban personnel during an attempted crossing from Afghanistan into Pakistan’s Kurram district. A Pakistani soldier was also killed in the exchange of fire. The Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), the military’s media wing, said Afghan Taliban border posts had opened fire in support of the attempted crossing. 

The incident came 10 days after Pakistani airstrikes in Afghanistan, which Islamabad said targeted militant camps and hideouts. Pakistan reported that the strikes killed 22 militants. At the same time, the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) confirmed that at least 10 civilians, most of them children, were killed and nine injured in Kunar and Helmand provinces. The U.N. mission called for de-escalation and greater protection of civilians, underscoring the humanitarian risks of continued cross-border hostilities.

These incidents reflect a wider deterioration in Afghanistan-Pakistan relations, driven in part by Islamabad’s concerns about militant groups operating from Afghan territory. 

On September 18, a suicide car bombing at a mosque inside the Kohat Police Lines complex in Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, followed by an armed assault, killed at least 31 people, including 16 police personnel, and injured more than 100, according to local police officials. Ittehadul Mujahideen Pakistan (IMP), a militant alliance linked to the Hafiz Gul Bahadur faction, claimed responsibility for the attack. The IMP operates within the broader network of militant groups active along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border and has had links with the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), a militant umbrella organization waging an insurgency against the Pakistani state. 

The scale of the threat is reflected in the 2026 Global Terrorism Index, which ranked the TTP as the world’s third-deadliest terrorist organization in 2025. The index identified rising violence by both the TTP and the Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA) as contributing to Pakistan’s worsening security environment. Islamabad has maintained that the Afghan Taliban authorities are allowing the militant outfits, including the TTP and the BLA, to maintain sanctuaries in Afghanistan, an allegation Kabul denies.

The Kohat attack was just one manifestation of a broader security dispute that has strained Afghanistan-Pakistan relations for years. In 2022, shortly after the Taliban returned to power in Afghanistan, Pakistan negotiated with the TTP through mediation by Afghanistan’s Taliban authorities. They reached a ceasefire in June 2022, but the agreement collapsed in November, when the TTP announced a resumption of attacks across Pakistan.

A February 2023 U.N. Security Council monitoring report cited assessments by several member states that the Taliban’s return to power in Afghanistan had emboldened the TTP and contributed to an escalation in its attacks against Pakistan. The report also examined links between the TTP and other armed groups. Subsequent U.N. Security Council monitoring reports have provided further support for Pakistan’s security concerns. A July 2024 report noted that the TTP continued to operate from Afghanistan and conduct attacks inside Pakistan, citing member states’ assessments of Taliban tolerance and support for the group. The December 2025 report went further, describing the continued harboring of TTP leaders in Afghanistan and the facilitation of the group’s operations by the Taliban authorities. 

As concerns about cross-border militancy persisted, Islamabad pursued a parallel response at home. In June 2024, the government approved Azm-e-Istehkam, a national framework........

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