The Pakistan Foreign Ministry on Friday said that Islamabad would not hold any peace talks with terrorist groups that have been launching attacks on its security forces and establishments.
The statement is significant given that Pakistan has braved repeated attacks from the proscribed Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP)* after the hardline group unilaterally ended its ceasefire with the federal government last November.
"Pakistan has been very consistent. The foreign minister has on record said that there would be no talks with the terrorist organisations that did not respect our laws and Constitution," Pakistan Foreign Office spokesperson Mumtaz Zahra Baloch told reporters in Islamabad.
Baloch elaborated that Pakistan's view regarding having no communication with terrorist organisations was clearly informed to the Chinese foreign minister Qin Gang and Afghanistan's Amir Khan Muttaqi during the recently held trilateral talks between the three nations.
Also, she mentioned that Pakistan Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari and Army Chief General Asim Munir dismissed Muttaqi's offer to begin a dialogue with the TTP as the banned militant outfit "did not respect Pakistan's laws and Constitution".
Baloch pointed out that Pakistan, China, and Afghanistan were determined to prevent militant groups like the TTP and East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM)* from using their territories to conduct attacks in the three countries.
In the trilateral statement, the three sides underscored the need to tackle the security challenges, posing a serious threat to regional peace and stability.
In the trilateral statement, the three sides underscored the need to tackle the security challenges, posing a serious threat to regional peace and stability.
"They agreed not to allow their territories to be used by any individual group or party, including the TTP and East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM), to conduct terrorist activities and actions. This was a joint statement that was a result of a consensus between the three delegations," the FO official said.
The ministry's rejection of holding talks with TTP comes at a time when Islamabad has repeatedly blamed the militant outfit for using Afghan territory to carry out attacks in Pakistan.
Reportedly, the widespread belief in Islamabad is that the Afghan Taliban** is offering safe sanctuaries to TTP cadres who conduct raids in Pakistan before crossing back into Afghanistan from the porous border that separates the two nations.
Last month, Pakistan Defence Minister Khawaja Muhammad Asif warned the Taliban of striking terrorist sanctuaries in Afghanistan if TTP attacks in his country continued unabated.
"We have communicated to Kabul during our last visit that please, as our neighbors and brothers, whatever is emanating from Afghan soil is your responsibility," he said. "If that is not done, at some point we'll have to […] resort to some measures, which will definitely — wherever [terrorists] are, their sanctuaries on Afghan soil — we'll have to hit them," he added. "We'll have to hit them because we cannot tolerate this situation for long."
* terrorist organisations banned in Russia
* under UN sanctions for terrorism