January 30, 2023
59 killed, 157 injured in bomb blast in Peshawar, Pakistan
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali
In a return to terrorist activities in Pakistan, at least 59 people were killed and 157 were injured in a blast inside a mosque shook Peshawar’s Police Lines area on Monday
The outlawed Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) claimed responsibility for the blast.
Speaking to the media, Peshawar Capital City Police Officer (CCPO) Muhammad Ijaz Khan said that the roof of the mosque collapsed after the blast. “A number of people are still stuck under the rubble and rescuers are trying to pull them out.”
He said the main hall of the mosque — which had a capacity of 250 to 300 people — had collapsed but the rest of the building was still intact.
Over the past few months, the law and order situation in the country has worsened, with terrorist groups executing attacks with near impunity across the country.
According to Dawn newspaper, since the talks with the TTP broke down in November, the militant group has intensified its attacks, particularly targeting the police in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and areas bordering Afghanistan. Insurgents in Balochistan have also stepped up their violent activities and formalized a nexus with the outlawed TTP.
On January 22, a police vehicle narrowly escaped a bomb blast in Peshawar’s Badaber area. A day earlier, a policeman was killed and two others were injured when unidentified assailants attacked a police post in Dheri Zardad locality of Charsadda.
On January 14, a deputy superintendent and two constables were killed when militants, armed with automatic assault weapons, targeted the Sarband police station on the outskirts of the province’s capital, Peshawar late at night.
TTP ends ceasefire with govt,
On November 28, 2022, the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) called off the ceasefire agreed with the government in June and ordered its militants to stage attacks across the country.
In a statement the group said: “As military operations are ongoing against mujahideen in different areas [...] so it is imperative for you to carry out attacks wherever you can in the entire country.”
The decision, it stated, was taken after "a series of non-stop attacks were launched by the military organizations in Bannu's Lakki Marwat district".
The banned group said it had repeatedly warned the people of Pakistan and "continued to be patient so that the negotiation process is not sabotaged at least by us."
"But the army and intelligence agencies did not stop and continued the attacks [...] now our retaliatory attacks will also start across the country," the statement said.
Talks between Pakistani officials and the militant outfit first started in October 2021 but broke down in December.
Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA)
One of the major the sticking point in the talks is TTP’s demand to end merger of Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) into Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.
FATA was a semi-autonomous tribal region in north-western Pakistan that existed from 1947 until being merged with neighboring province Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in 2018 with the Twenty-fifth Amendment to the Constitution of Pakistan passed by the Parliament as well as Provincial Assembly of KPK.
Tellingly, parliamentarians from tribal areas took strong exception to a resolution adopted by the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa assembly asking for merger of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas with their province. The FATA merger was also opposed by tribal parliamentarians in Islamabad. The name Qabailistan was proposed for FATA as a new province separate from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
Abdus Sattar Ghazali is the Editor -in-Chief of the Journal of America: www.journalofamerica.net. email: asghazali2011@gmail.com
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The Journal of America Team:
Editor in chief:
Abdus Sattar Ghazali
Senior Editor:
Prof. Arthur Scott
Special Correspondent
Maryam Turab
