In what looks like a bid to extend its influence in the South Asian region, so-called Islamic State (IS) militants have allegedly distributed 12-page pamphlets in the north-west of Pakistan, in Peshawar and in Afghan refugee camps based near its outskirts, it was reported in early September.
They were written in Pashto and Dari, and titled Fatah (Victory) The editor’s name, however, appears fake and their place of publication obscure. For a long time, Afghan resistance groups, including the Haqqani Network, Hizb-e-Islami Afghanistan and the Tora Bora group have published similar pamphlets, magazines and propaganda literature in Peshawar’s black markets. However this latest spread has raised fears of a possible link between IS and such militants, threatening all non-Muslims.
Military offensive
As the IS declared a caliphate in areas of Iraq and Syria, Pakistan launched a joint military offensive to end a ‘caliphate’ apparently set up by a Pakistani Taliban cluster of over 35 groups, Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), in north Pakistan’s lawless tribal areas along its Afghan border. A number of the local and foreign militant groups said they wanted to ‘strive for the enforcement of shari’a Islamic not only in Pakistan and Afghanistan, but throughout the world’.
The attack against them by the Pakistani army started in mid-June, but air attacks (including by helicopter gunships) continued into August.
In the wake of this fully-fledged military offensive – called Zarb-e-Azb, a ‘sharp strike with the sword of Prophet Muhammad’– at least 700,000 residents of North Waziristan have been internally displaced, while another 75,000 to 100,000 have crossed into Afghanistan. Pakistan is already home to the largest displaced population of Afghans, 1.6 million refugees.
The US has long been urging Pakistan to conduct an operation against the Taliban in the tribal regions. Pakistan conducted a joint military operation in April 2009 in the area of Swat. The army generals were ready to launch a full offensive on the Taliban in North Waziristan, but the then military chief feared a backlash from the religious right and delayed the operation.
Most internally displaced people have fled to Bannu. Among them are about 1,200 Christians who first stayed in the Anglican mission-run Pennell High School and Girls’ College. The region’s Minority Workers’ Society president, Khalid Iqbal, said: ‘We walked 24 hours to reach Bannu because curfew was lifted only for a day… the Church of Pakistan provided us with food and shelter’.
