Fazl to break the ice in talks with Taliban

In a bid to break the impasse in the peace talks between the government and the new leadership of Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), JUI-F chief Maulana Fazlur Rahman on Wednesday announced to form a broad-based jirga comprising of tribal elders and top leaders from all political parties belonging to FATA including the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) to convince the Taliban insurgents to agree on peace talks.

The move reflects that the government has sought help from Maulana to break the frozen dialogue. Fazl, surprisingly, has announced to include PTI elders in jirga to send a goodwill gesture to Imran Khan whose relations have not been good with Maulana in the recent past.

In a statement, Maulana Fazl said the JUI-F would soon reconvene tribal jirga of FATA to help government jump start peace process stalled in the wake of US drone attack. However, no specific date has so far been fixed for the jirga. Fazal said the drone strike halted peace process with the Taliban, however, there was a dire need to seek new ways to resume the dialogue process.

“The tribal jirga convened in February 2013 in Islamabad was backed by the national leadership. This time round, we will go back to the jirga to take its members into confidence and seek new ideas for moving forward,” said the statement.

He said without involving the people of FATA, there could be no effective mechanism for talks with the Taliban. He said the jirga would help the government guide its efforts for reconciliation. A third party would not be allowed to hijack their national bid to seek peace and reconciliation, he added.

In an exclusive talk with Pakistan Today, JUI spokesperson Jan Achakzai said the jirga was being convened to break the ice in the dialogue process.

Achakzai said new ideas would be explored during the jirga which would later contact the Taliban for taking into consideration their concerns,” he added.

Asked if it was a step back or a step forward in talks, Achakzai said the government had used couriers to convey its message to the Taliban leadership.

“A messenger can only convey a message and anyone has a right to refuse any messenger. But no one can refuse regarding anything to a jirga which is our tradition,” he added. When asked, Achakzai said the federal government was fully on board over the jirga. “We are very much a part of the government, so the jirga is being convened by the government,” he added.

He said the move was aimed at resolving all differences between the government and the Taliban for which all tribal elders besides political parties, especially PTI, would be a part of the jirga.

However, talking on another occasion, Fazl said he did know the names of those included in the negotiation process with the Taliban. Instead, he requested the government to make public the names of those who were going to hold talks with the Taliban.

Talking about the statement of Munawar Hassan, Maulana said Pakistan Army held grip over national matters and the JI only expressed its viewpoint, however, Munawar should have issued a balanced statement, he added.