Interior Minister A Rehman Malik on Wednesday said that fugitive Taliban leader in Swat Maulana Fazlullah has been critically injured in the on-going military operation in Malakand division. "It has been confirmed that he has been hit and seriously injured," he told BBC in an interview.
He said most of these so-called Taliban leaders hide during the military action. "However, we will bring them out of their hideouts," Malik said. He urged the world community especially United Nations to help Pakistan determine where the Taliban are getting money and weapons from.
"These militants who are sitting in South Waziristan and planning terrorist activities from there, I won't call them Taliban, I would call them Zaliman," Malik said. Answering a question, Malik said the so-called unity in the extremists, which began as the government increased its activities against Baitullah Mehsud was something the government had already anticipated.
"Be it Gul Bahadur or Commander Nazeer, be it Qari Hussain or Baitullah or Hakimullah - they are all branches of the same tree. They all are hardcore terrorists who should be called Zaliman and not Taliban,' Malik said. "These `Zaliman' were already present in South Waziristan and have been planning their terrorist activities from there," he said, adding that Fazlullah was also their colleague.
They had made small groups, which were later turned into this larger group called the Tehrik-i-Taliban, Rehman Malik said. "When these terrorists saw that Pakistan's enemies were giving them a lot of cash, cars and that there is good money in this, then they also involved Lashkar-i-Jhangvi and Jaish-i-Mohammad in their work.
When asked if there was a possibility of dialogue with the militants, the Interior Minister said the government had engaged in talks only with moderate elements, and the deal in Swat was made only because Sufi Mohammad promised, he would handle everything there.
Comments
Comments are closed.