The Express Tribune reported that a senior Pakistani official has rejected Taliban’s Foreign Minister, Amir Khan Muttaqi’s claim that Islamabad is withdrawing from peace talks with the Pakistani Taliban.
This official said that the peace talks failed due to “unreasonable and unconstitutional demands” of the TTP.
The Pakistani official, who did not want to be named, said that the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan sought to dominate parts of the country's tribal areas during the negotiations.
Earlier, Pakistani Senator Mushahid Hussain was quoted by the Pakistani media outlets as stating that during discussions at the Tehran conference on Palestine, Muttaqi told him that most of the issues between TTP and Pakistani government have been solved, except for the “merger of the former Federally Administered Tribal Areas”.
According to the media reports, Muttaqi claimed that while both sides were on the verge of finalising an agreement, Pakistan withdrew from negotiations.
Taliban’s foreign minister has not publicly commented on these reports yet.
In its report, Express Tribune wrote that the senior Pakistani official who didn’t to be named, called Muttaqi’s statement "absurd" and said that his narrative was not true.
The source informed The Express Tribune that the TTP aimed to establish their own “empire within the former tribal areas” under the guise of peace talks.
