ISLAMABAD: The Pakistan Army has released a video statement of former Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) spokesman Ehsanullah Ehsan in which the arrested militant confesses to giving information to hostile agencies and providing the enemy’s forces with targets for terrorist activities.
The militant spokesman can be seen admitting the terrorist organisation’s nexus with Indian and Afghan intelligence agencies and security forces in carrying out subversive activities in Pakistan.
Earlier this month, DG ISPR Major General Asif Ghafoor had announced the Ehsanullah Ehsan, spokesperson of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan’s splinter group Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, had surrendered to the Pakistan Army.
Ehsan was previously the spokesperson of the TTP but later joined Jamaat-ul-Ahrar splinter faction.
TTP ‘misled people in the name of Islam’
“My name is Liaquat Ali alias Ehsanullah Ehsan and I am from Mohmand agency. I joined the TTP in 2008. I was a college student back then. I was also the spokesman for the TTP Mohmand agency chapter. After that, I became the central spokesman for the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, and later the spokesman for the Jamaat-ul-Ahrar,” Ehsan can be heard saying in the video statement.
“I have seen a lot in the nine years with the TTP. They recruited people by misleading them in the name of Islam, especially the youth, for their own gains,” he says.
“They (TTP) themselves could not come up to the standards they advocated,” he says.
“A particular group is extorting money from innocent Muslims, killing and kidnapping them. These people carry out bombings in public places, attack schools, colleges and universities. Islam does not teach us this.”
Fazlullah was elected through lucky draw’
The former TTP and JuA spokesman also reveals details of a battle of succession that ensued between different terrorist leaders after the killing of former TTP chief Hakimullah Mehsud in late 2013.
“When the operation started in the tribal areas, the quest for power intensified in these people and everyone wanted to be the leader of the organisation.”
Ehsanullah says that, after the killing of Hakimullah, the process of succession started in the organization and a sort of electoral campaign started. “During this time Omar Khalid Korasani, Khan Saeed Sajna, Mullah Fazlullah they were all a part of this. Everyone wanted to gain power so the shura decided that names would shortlisted through a lucky draw through which Mullah Fazullah was elected the leader.”
“What can you expect from an organisation whose leader is elected through a lucky draw? And then the leader was a person of questionable character, who married his mentor’s daughter by force and took her away. These types of personalities, these types of people, are neither capable of nor are they serving Islam,” he says.
“After the operation in North Waziristan, we all fled to Afghanistan. I saw there (in Afghanistan) these people developed contacts with India and RAW. They (India and RAW) supported, provided finances, and targets. They (TTP) took money for every activity they did,” admits the former militant spokesman, a confirmation of Pakistan’s long held position that Indian spy agency RAW and Afghanistan’s National Directorate of Intelligence have been fomenting terrorism in Pakistan.
“They pushed TTP soldiers on the frontlines to fight against the Pakistan Army and they themselves went into hiding,” he says.
India issued ID cards to TTP terrorists
“When they started taking help from India and RAW, I told Omer Khalid Kohrasani that what we are doing is helping the kuffar (non-believers) by conducting activity in our country with their (India and RAW) money. It was a type assistance to them (India and RAW).
“He (Khorasani) told me that even if offered by Israel he would take funds to destablise Pakistan. At this point I figured out that through a specific agenda and for their own self-interests they (TTP) were doing all of this.
“These organisations have formed committees in Afghanistan through which they maintain contact with India and RAW. The Indians had issued them ID cards through which they could move around with ease. These ID cards in Afghanistan had the same function as the ID cards in Pakistan. Without this document and keeping in mind the security situation in Afghanistan, it would be difficult for them to move in that country,” he says.
