Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Chief Minister Ali Amin Gandapur on Thursday lashed out against nurturing “good Taliban” and demanded the center include his province in any decision-making on Pakistan’s ties with Afghanistan.
Addressing a press conference after an all-party conference—boycotted by major opposition parties—on law and order in the province, Gandapur said he opposed any new military offensive against rising terrorism. He claimed past operations had failed to achieve their desired objectives and only caused widespread destruction.
He claimed that police had conducted several operations against the “good Taliban”—a descriptive often used for “rehabilitated” militants—and arrested them, but the “institutions” had subsequently released them claiming they were “useful” to them. “Now they [good Taliban] have come again. Please, these ‘good Taliban’ are not acceptable and if you really want to keep them, give them uniform, and send them to Kashmir,” he said, adding the government would act against anyone carrying arms.
“Anyone who is keeping these ‘good Taliban’ should expel and eliminate them,” he said.
The chief minister said border management was the responsibility of the federal government but it had failed in this endeavor as militant infiltration from Afghanistan persisted. “Deploy the military on the border. We have the capacity to manage things inside the province,” he claimed, adding he would be responsible if the police failed to fulfil their responsibilities. He said the KP government wanted clearly defined roles so everyone could be held accountable for their failures. He said the APC’s participants believed police were sufficiently trained to maintain law and order in the province.
“They [military] are not doing their core job and instead are roaming in an area that falls within my jurisdiction,” he claimed, reiterating that military operations only inflict damage without any positive results. The provincial government, he vowed, would not tolerate any new operation. He said the province would recruit 300 new police officers in every tribal district from locals to strengthen law enforcement capacity.
Gandapur also criticized drone attacks in KP, alleging they were being carried out by both security forces and terrorists, causing civilian deaths. He said the multi-party moot had declared quadcopters would not be used for action against militants.
Maintaining the federal government had failed to fulfill its commitments under the NFC Award, he said the province’s assets could not be granted to any other authority. In this regard, he condemned the imposition of taxes in the erstwhile tribal areas. “We do not accept these taxes and will not cooperate with the federal government on their collection,” he said. He also opposed the recent transformation of the Frontier Constabulary into a federal force, saying the province would challenge the decision in court.
“[Foreign Minister] Ishaq Dar lacks the competence to effectively advocate for this province,” he said of the federal government’s ongoing engagements with Afghanistan. “[Interior Minister] Mohsin Naqvi only understands cricket and flyovers. He has no knowledge of KP’s ground realities,” he added.
The gathering, said Gandapur, had expressed solidarity with the families of terrorism victims and stressed on intelligence-based operations to eliminate terrorists. It also approved convening a Jirga comprising elders, parliamentarians, and stakeholders from every district. The first Jirga, he said, would be followed by a grand Jirga with participation of members nominated by the first Jirga to devise a strategy for the implementation for these decisions.
Center’s response
In a response to Gandapur’s opposition to the use of quadcopters against militants, Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi posted on X, maintaining that all available resources would be used for the elimination of terrorism. He also appeared to take a shot at the chief minister’s lamentation of the “good Taliban” by asking how much money “an important KP government leader in D.I. Khan pays monthly to the Taliban.”