The Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) Shura contacted the Taliban intermediary committee for the first time on Tuesday since the deadlock, stated Professor Mohammad Ibrahim, who is one of the members of the TTP committee.
During a press conference on February 17, Professor Ibrahim had said that the TTP committee was a neutral body acting as a bridge between the government and the TTP in the talks process.
Professor Ibrahim said that he was in contact with the TTP Shura via telephone and discussed the killings of the 23 Frontier Corps (FC) men with them.
The peace talks took a new turn two weeks after they began following a claim from the Mohmand Agency chapter of the TTP on February 16 that they had executed 23 soldiers who were kidnapped in June 2010.
The paramilitary soldiers from the Frontier Corps (FC) vanished after the TTP attacked their check post in Mohmand tribal district on June 17, 2010.
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had called the deaths “heinous” and warned they would impact attempts at reconciliation, while government peace negotiators pulled out of scheduled talks.
Professor Ibrahim further said that ceasefire would have been agreed upon on Monday if the Mohmand incident had not happened.
The government negotiators and TTP intermediaries were scheduled to meet on February 17 but the meeting was called off after the killings.