david waker 
What is behind a resurgence of violent attacks in Pakistan?
Islamabad, Pakistan – Pakistan is going through a resurgence of violent assaults, with analysts pronouncing the authorities should right away devise a method to counter the hazard to inner safety because the u . s . heads into an election year.
Sunday noticed at the least 9 assaults withinside the restive southwestern province of Balochistan, killing at the least six safety employees. Two of these assaults have to this point been claimed with the aid of using Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), an armed organization additionally referred to as Pakistani Taliban for its ideological affinity with the Afghan Taliban.
The TTP handiest closing month unilaterally declared an give up to a ceasefire agreed upon with the authorities and issued orders to its opponents to perform assaults throughout the u . s ..
On Friday, the TTP claimed duty for a suicide assault withinside the federal capital of Islamabad, wherein at the least one police officer died and numerous different humans had been wounded.
A week earlier, Pakistani safety forces fought off the TTP attackers in Bannu metropolis withinside the northwestern province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa once they held safety employees hostage for greater than forty hours.
Amid such safety concerns, america embassy in Islamabad on Sunday issued an alert to its staff, caution of a likely assault on one in all Islamabad`s pinnacle motels frequented with the aid of using the Americans.In a statement, the embassy said “unknown people are in all likelihood plotting to assault Americans on the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad someday in the course of the [Christmas] holidays”.
one hundred fifty TTP assaults this year
Islamabad-primarily based totally studies enterprise Pakistan Institute for Peace Studies (PIPS) estimates the TTP and its associate companies done greater than one hundred fifty assaults withinside the first eleven months of this year, ensuing in greater than one hundred fifty deaths, a majority of them belonging to regulation enforcement agencies.
PIPS director Amir Rana instructed Al Jazeera the growing fashion of assaults portrays a grim scenario for Pakistan, that is scheduled to keep widespread elections subsequent year.
If the country`s safety equipment does now no longer devise an powerful counterterrorism policy, matters are going to get out of hand. It may be paying homage to the 2013 election marketing campaign which became pretty bloody, and we might also additionally see a repeat,” he said.
Since its formation in 2007, the TTP has been waging a riot in opposition to the country of Pakistan, annoying stricter imposition of Islamic laws, the discharge of its contributors arrested with the aid of using the authorities, and a reversal of the merger of Pakistan`s tribal regions with Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.
The upward thrust of the Afghan Taliban, who took over Kabul closing year, emboldened the organization, main to a spike in its assaults. Most of the organization`s management has taken safe haven in Afghanistan, officers say.
Late closing year, peace talks started among Islamabad and the TTP, facilitated with the aid of using the Afghan Taliban. Despite the talks and a ceasefire agreed upon in June, assaults with the aid of using the organization continuedAbdul Basit, a studies fellow at S Rajaratnam School of International Studies in Singapore, thinks the Pakistani safety forces have become complacent of their combat in opposition to the TTP as soon as the peace talks started.
It seems that the navy concept that peace talks with the TTP will supply dividends, in order that they had been reactive rather than proactively in search of to dismantle diverse TTP networks,” he instructed Al Jazeera.
The TTP took benefit of this lull and controlled to regroup in a greater devastating manner, Basit said.The Pakistani navy became stuck snoozing as soon as the assaults had been launched, and I don`t suppose there has been any attempt to dismantle the TTP network,” he said.
Brigadier Muhammad Zeeshan, a former navy officer, is now the director widespread of Centre for Peace, Security and Developmental Studies, a suppose-tank primarily based totally in Islamabad. He thinks TTP opponents taking safe haven in Afghanistan got here returned after the Taliban takeover there.
