Peshawar, Jan 22 (PTI) The Islamic State’s Afghanistan affiliate, dubbed Islamic State Khorasan or IS-K, posed a bigger threat to peace and integrity of Pakistan’s restive province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa than the outlawed Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), the provincial police said on Saturday.
The IS-K, which has stepped up attacks in several cities in Afghanistan after the Taliban seized power in Kabul in August last year, was also responsible for carrying out a spate of terror attacks against Pakistan’s security officials in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.
I see IS-K as a bigger threat to peace and security in the province compared to the TTP in near future, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa police chief Moazzam Jah Ansari said.
In October last year, IS-K had also claimed responsibility for the killing of a well-known Sikh hakeem named Sardar Satnam Singh (Khalsa), who practised Unani medicine here in the provincial capital.
At least three police personnel were killed in different parts of the province in the months of October and November.
Ansari said following these sustained attacks, police had busted a cell of the IS-K in Peshawar on December 20 last year.
While both TTP and IS-K were responsible for attacks on security forces in Pakistan, Ansari believed that the latter posed a great threat because when one of its cells became dysfunctional, another cell began operations.
These [militant] outfits are operating in small groups and the neutralisation of one cell does not end the possibility of another cell resorting to similar acts, Ansari explained.
He said that there had been security issues in North and South Waziristan tribal districts, but the security officials had acted swiftly to enforce the writ of the state.
Ansari said the provincial and federal governments were focusing on development of tribal areas and creating employment opportunities for the youth.
These efforts will motivate the people to support government efforts for peace, he opined.
The police chief said his force had completed the training of 17,000 out of 27,000 Levies and Khasadar Force personnel in the tribal districts.
The police force was working in tandem with Pakistan’s armed forces for bringing peace back in the region, Ansari added.
According to a US State Department’s report, IS-K received funding from its parent organisation, the militant Islamic State group (IS), with additional funding coming from illicit criminal commerce, taxes and extortion activities.
The IS-K’s leadership has pledged allegiance to the deceased IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.