Hakimullah Mehsud not to be replaced: TTP

The Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) has denied any rift among their ranks, saying said is no plan to replace Hakimullah Mehsud with Waliur Rehman as the new chief of the outlawed organisation.
TTP spokesman Eshanullah Eshan said, “The reports have no truth, we held the main shura meeting two weeks ago in North Waziristan Agency and all 42 members or their representatives attended the meeting chaired by Hakimullah Mehsud which is sufficient enough to rebuff reports of any change in the TTP top slot.” To a query, Eshan, who claimed to have also attended that meeting, said, “Waliur Rehman and all the other top leadership from Mohmand, Bajaur, Dara Adam Khel and the rest of Pakistan had attended the meeting and reposed confidence in Hakimullah Mehsud besides discussing TTP’s organisational affairs.” However, the TTP spokesman acknowledged that only Mullah Fazlullah, the Taliban chief of Malakand, was absent and that he had sent his representative to attend the shura meeting in his place as he was not allowed to travel due to security concerns.
Ehsan also denied the claim by a foreign news agency that Rehman had been in touch with the administration and there was a plan he would be entering into some agreement with the government and starting a rebellion against Hakimullah. About the change in the TTP leadership, Ehsan said, “Until our ameer is following the sharia laws and taking decisions according to the Islamic sharia, no one is going to defect or rise against him and the reports in this regard are merely propaganda.” He also ruled out any truce with the administration, who according to him, was following dictates from abroad. To another query about Hakimullah’s relations with Rehman and Fazlullah, the TTP spokesman said, “There is no problem at all.” Discussing the US withdrawal and the transportation of military hardware back to the US via Pakistani land route, Ehsan said, “We are waiting for this target since long and have already planned to destroy it,” adding, “There is no doubt that this stuff will not go back in one piece, the US and their Pakistani counterparts are one and the same for the TTP and would be targeted alike.”