Militants have Pakistan's police in their crosshairs 

A police officer looks outside the window of a gate at Achini's outpost, in the outskirts of Peshawar, Pakistan, February 9, 2023. (Photo courtesy: REUTERS)
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Updated 27 February 2023
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Militants have Pakistan's police in their crosshairs 

  • Killings of policemen in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa rose to 119 last year, from 54 in 2021 and 21 in 2020
  • Some 102 have been slain already this year, most in a mosque bombing but some in other attacks

BARA, Pakistan: Atop a police outpost in northwest Pakistan, Faizanullah Khan stands behind a stack of sandbags and peers through the sight of an anti-aircraft gun, scanning the terrain along the unofficial boundary with the country's restive former tribal areas. 

On this cold and rainy February morning, he was looking not for aircraft but for fighters behind attacks against his force, the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa provincial police. 

It was daytime, so he could relax a bit, said Khan, an assistant sub-inspector, as he sat down on a traditional woven bed. But night was a different story, he said, pointing to pock marks left by bullets fired at the outpost, named Manzoor Shaheed, or Manzoor the Martyr, after a colleague felled by insurgents years ago. 

The outpost is one of dozens that provide defence against militants waging a fresh assault on Pakistan's police from hideouts in the border region adjoining Taliban-controlled Afghanistan. The area, part of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province, is a hotbed for fighters of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), an umbrella organisation of militant groups.

The threat the insurgency poses to nuclear-armed Pakistan was illustrated last month when the bombing of a mosque in Peshawar killed more than 80 police personnel. A faction of the TTP, Jamat-ul-Ahrar, claimed responsibility. 

Visiting northwest Pakistan this month, Reuters gained access to police outposts and spoke to more than a dozen people, including senior police officials, many of whom described how the force is suffering increasing losses as it bears the brunt of insurgent attacks while contending with resourcing and logistical constraints. 

Pakistani officials acknowledge these challenges but say they are trying to improve the force's capability amid adverse economic circumstances. 




A police officer rappels off a building during a practice session at the Elite Police Training Centre in Nowshera, Pakistan, February 10, 2023. (Photo courtesy: REUTERS)

'Stopped their way' 

Police here have fought militants for years -- more than 2,100 personnel have been killed and 7,000 injured since 2001 -- but never have they been the focus of militants' operations as they are today. 

"We've stopped their way to Peshawar," assistant sub-inspector Jameel Shah of Sarband station, which controls the Manzoor Shaheed outpost, said of the militants. 

Sarband and its eight outposts have suffered four major attacks in recent months and faced sniper fire with unprecedented frequency, according to police based there. 

Killings of police in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa rose to 119 last year, from 54 in 2021 and 21 in 2020. Some 102 have been slain already this year, most in the mosque bombing but some in other attacks. Elsewhere, militants stormed a police office in Karachi on Feb. 17, killing four before security forces retook the premises and killed three assailants. 

The TTP, known as the Pakistani Taliban, pledges allegiance to the Afghan Taliban but is not directly a part of the group that rules in Kabul. Its stated aim is to impose Islamic religious law in Pakistan. 

A TTP spokesman, Muhammad Khurasani, told Reuters its main target was Pakistan's military, but the police were standing in the way. 

"The police have been told many times not to obstruct our way, and instead of paying heed to this the police have started martyring our comrades," he said. "This is why we are targeting them." 

The military has conducted operations alongside the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa police and faced TTP attacks, with one soldier confirmed dead in the province this year, according to data released by the military's public relations wing, which did not address questions from Reuters about military casualties. 

In December, the TTP released a video purportedly recorded by one of its fighters from mountains around the capital, Islamabad, showing Pakistan's parliament building. "We are coming," said a note held by the unidentified fighter. 

The TTP wants to show that its fighters can strike outside their current areas of influence, said Amir Rana, director of the Pak Institute for Peace Studies, an Islamabad-based think tank. While their ability may be limited, he said, "propaganda is a big part of this war and the TTP are getting good at it". 




Police officers hold their weapons during a training session at the Elite Police Training Centre in Nowshera, Pakistan, February 10, 2023. (Photo courtesy: REUTERS)

'Sitting ducks' 

The police in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, which neighbours Islamabad, say they are up for the fight, but point to a lack of resources. 

"The biggest problem is the number of personnel, which is a little low," said Shah, of Sarband station, which has 55 people -- including drivers and clerks -- for the station and eight affiliated outposts. "This is a target area, and we're absolutely face-to-face with (the militants)." 

Days before Reuters visited Sarband, a senior police official was ambushed and killed outside the station during a firefight with militants. The attack demonstrated the firepower of the insurgents, who, according to Shah, used thermal goggles to target the officer in darkness. 

It wasn't the first time. About a year ago, the TTP released a video of its snipers using thermal imaging to take out unsuspecting security personnel. 

Pakistan Defence Minister Khawaja Asif, who did not respond to a request for comment from Reuters about the insurgency, told local TV this month that militants saw the police as "soft targets" because their public-facing role made it easier to penetrate their facilities. 

Zahid Hussain, a journalist and author of books on militancy, said the police were more vulnerable than the military, given their resources and training. 

"I mean, they're sitting ducks there," Hussain said. 




People pray for the victims who were killed in a suicide bombing in January, in a mosque that was partially damaged during the attack in the Police Lines area in Peshawar, Pakistan, February 9, 2023. (Photo courtesy: REUTERS)

'Lethal weapons' 

Moazzam Jah Ansari, who was chief of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa's police when he spoke to Reuters this month but has since been replaced, said militant strategies had been evolving.

"They try and find more effective ways to conduct military operations, more lethal weapons," he said. 

Militants have procured U.S.-made M4 rifles and other sophisticated weapons from stocks left by Western forces that exited Afghanistan in 2021, police officials said. Some police guards told Reuters they had seen small reconnaissance drones flying over their outposts. 

Khurasani, the TTP spokesman, confirmed that the group was using drones for surveillance. 

Several police officials at Sarband station said the provincial government and military provided them and other outposts with thermal goggles in late January to aid the fight. But they encountered another problem. 

"About 22 hours of the day we have power outages... there's no electricity to charge our goggles," Shah told Reuters at Sarband. 

The station has one rooftop solar panel, which officers paid out of their own pockets to install, according to station chief Qayyum Khan. One policeman, who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of disciplinary action, said police use their vehicles or go to a petrol station equipped with a back-up generator to charge their goggles. 

Police said they had taken other protection measures, including erecting rudimentary walls to guard against sniper fire, and procuring bulletproof glass from a market that sells equipment left behind by U.S.-led forces. 




Imam Noor ul Ameen, 35, who is also a police employee, holds his palms as he leads a prayer for the victims who were killed in a suicide bombing in January, in a mosque that was partially damaged during the attack in the Police Lines area, in Peshawar, Pakistan, February 9, 2023. (Photo courtesy: REUTERS)

Economic conditions 

Reuters spoke to four other senior officials and more than a dozen lower-ranking officers, all of whom said the provincial force was neglected despite its key role. They spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of disciplinary action. 

Required resources were not forthcoming, and their pay and perks were inferior to that of counterparts elsewhere in Pakistan, let alone the military, these officials told Reuters. 

"Do the police need more resources? They absolutely do," said Taimur Jhagra, who was provincial finance minister until January, when a caretaker administration took over ahead of elections. 

Jhagra said his government helped the police as much as it could with pay raises and procuring equipment such as goggles, despite fiscal constraints. Pakistan's debt-ridden economy has been in a tailspin for over a year, and the country is trying to slash spending to avoid default. 

"Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa pays a greater price for that" because of its exposure to the militants, he said. 

Ansari, the former police chief, said resources had improved, but tended to come reactively when a threat emerged, rather than as sustained support. He, too, attributed this to economic circumstances, but added that things were not as bad as some suggested. 

'Seething anger' 

After Western forces left Afghanistan in August 2021, Pakistan sought a truce with the TTP, resulting in a months-long ceasefire and negotiations brokered by the Afghan Taliban. As part of the effort, many militants from Afghanistan were resettled in Pakistan. 

The TTP ended the ceasefire in November 2022, and regrouped militants restarted attacks in Pakistan soon after. 

Following the Peshawar bombing, police personnel held public protests where some voiced anger against their leadership, the provincial and national governments, and even the military, calling for more resources and clarity on the policy of fighting the militants. Ansari acknowledged a "deep sense of loss" and "seething anger" in the force in the wake of the attack. 

At the site of the blast, police personnel gathered on a recent day to remember their fallen comrades. The imam, a police employee who lost his brother in the attack, prayed for the success of the force. 

Behind the mosque, Daulat Khan, an assistant sub-inspector, and eight relatives live in cramped police quarters comprising a 25-square-metre space with only one room. Around him are crumbling, blast-damaged walls. 

"Everyone can see the sacrifices of the police, but nothing is done for us," he said, pointing to rows of century-old, British-colonial era quarters. "You see the conditions in front of you." 

Outside, open sewage canals lined the alleyways. 




A billboard with photos of police officers who died in the line of duty is seen in the Police Lines area, Peshawar, Pakistan, February 9, 2023. (Photo courtesy: REUTERS)

Different battle 

Pakistan's military effectively dismantled the TTP and killed most of its top leadership in a string of operations from 2014 onwards, driving most of the fighters into Afghanistan, where they regrouped. 

But the nature of the fight has changed in recent months, which partly shows why the police, not the military, are at the forefront. The militants were now spread in smaller groups across the country and among the civilian population, instead of operating from bases in former tribal areas, analysts said.  

The military has also been stretched by another insurgency in the southwestern province of Balochistan, where separatists are targeting state infrastructure and Chinese investments. 

The defence ministry did not respond to requests for comment about the armed forces' role in resisting militants in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. 

Miles from the flashpoints, meanwhile, police graduates receive six-month crash courses in anti-militant operations at the vast Elite Police Training Centre in Nowshera. 

The personnel, including women, learn how to conduct raids, rappel from buildings and use rocket-propelled grenades and anti-aircraft guns, which they unleash on a model of a militant training camp. 

But beyond the training school's walls, there is no stationary militant camp, attacks come at night, and police are often on their own. 

Faizanullah Khan said that, on some nights at his outpost, militants call out to him or his fellow guards. "They say 'we see you; lay down your arms'," he said. 

The guards sometimes reply, he said, by firing their guns into the darkness.


Pakistan unveils first-ever policy to regulate digital assets in line with FATF guidelines

Updated 5 sec ago
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Pakistan unveils first-ever policy to regulate digital assets in line with FATF guidelines

  • New policy will set rules for the operation of digital currencies and related companies in Pakistan
  • Pakistan Crypto Council was established in March to create legal framework for digital currencies

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan has introduced its first-ever policy framework to regulate virtual assets and service providers, aligning with compliance and financial integrity guidelines of the global Financial Action Task Force (FATF), the country’s top investigation agency said on Thursday.
The new policy, created by a special government group under the Anti-Money Laundering (AML) and Counter Terrorism Financing (CTF) authority, is meant to set rules for how digital money like cryptocurrencies and the companies that deal in it should operate in Pakistan.
The move follows the establishment of the Pakistan Crypto Council last month to create a legal framework to create a legal framework for cryptocurrency trading in a bid to lure international investment. 
Cryptocurrencies including bitcoin are not officially regulated in Pakistan but are also not illegal or banned. As of Jan. 16, 2021, the State Bank of Pakistan has not authorized any individuals or organizations to carry out the sale, purchase, exchange, and investment of virtual currencies, coins, and tokens.
“Pakistan has formulated its first-ever comprehensive policy framework for the regulation of Virtual Assets and Virtual Asset Service Providers,” the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) said in a statement. 
The policy will be scrutinized by stakeholders and legislative proceedings before being implemented in phases from next year.
The policy aims to curb money laundering, terrorism financing, financial instability and the potentials of blockchain-based finance and also provide space for innovation and develop institutional expertise. 
“This is a paradigm shift in how Pakistan views digital finance,” FIA Director Sumera Azam was quoted in the statement as saying. “The policy proposal seeks to strike a historic balance between technological advancement and national security imperatives.”
She added that the framework aligned with FATF Recommendation 15 on compliance and financial integrity.
FATF Recommendation 15, titled “New Technologies,” ensures that AML and CFT frameworks are adaptable to emerging financial technologies, including virtual assets and virtual asset service providers.


Pakistan markets rebound as Trump makes tariff U-turn

Updated 25 min 50 sec ago
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Pakistan markets rebound as Trump makes tariff U-turn

  • US President Donald Trump has announced a 90-day delay in tariffs
  • KSE-100 Index surged by over 2,036 points following the announcement

KARACHI: Pakistan’s stock market bounced back on Thursday after US President Donald Trump announced a 90-day delay in tariffs, analysts said. 
The KSE-100 Index surged by over 2,036 points (1.75 percent), following the announcement.
On Wednesday (April 9), the KSE-100 Index had dropped 5 percent, leading to a 45-minute halt in trading.
Zafar Moti, CEO of Zafar Moti Capital Securities, said the decision helped calm investors, while Ahsan Mehanti, Managing Director and CEO of Arif Habib Group, said the pause in tariffs was seen as good news by investors.
“The Pakistan Stock Exchange closed on a positive note,” Topline Securities said in its daily market review.
“This upward trajectory was fueled by a strong rebound in US and other international equity markets, with the index rallying as much as 3,331 points during intraday trading.”


No extension in deadline to deport illegal foreigners from Pakistan — minister

Updated 10 April 2025
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No extension in deadline to deport illegal foreigners from Pakistan — minister

  • Over 850,000 people repatriated since a deportation drive was launched in late 2023
  • Pakistan has expelled over 8,000 Afghan nationals in the past week, UNHRC says

ISLAMABAD: State Minister for Interior Talal Chaudhry said on Thursday the government was not considering extending the deadline for illegal foreigners to leave the country, with over 850,000 people repatriated since a deportation drive was launched in late 2023. 
Earlier this year, Pakistan’s interior ministry asked all “illegal foreigners” and holders of Afghan Citizen Cards — a document launched in 2017 to grant temporary legal status to Afghan refugees — to leave the country before Mar. 31, warning that they would otherwise be deported from April 1. The move is part of a larger repatriation drive of foreign citizens that began in November 2023.
Pakistan has expelled more than 8,000 Afghan nationals in the past week in a fresh repatriation drive after the expiry of a March 31 deadline, the UNHCR said on Tuesday. 
“The first and foremost thing I want to share with you is that there is no deadline extension [to deport illegal foreigners] being considered or given, nor will there be any extension,” Chaudhry said at a press conference, saying 857,157 people had been repatriated since 2023, including those residing in Pakistan illegally and ACC holders.
“Particularly in the case of Afghan nationals, this decision had to be made after considering some ground realities,” he said, accusing Afghan nations of being involved in militant attacks, narcotics trade and other crimes.
Last year was the deadliest year in almost a decade in Pakistan, with more than 1,600 people killed in militant attacks, nearly half of them security forces personnel, according to the Islamabad-based Center for Research and Security Studies. 
Pakistan accuses the Taliban government of failing to root out militants sheltering on Afghan soil, a charge Kabul denies, saying it does not allow its territory to be used by militants against Pakistan. It also says Afghan nationals are not involved in terrorism and other crimes in Pakistan and Islamabad’s security and criminality issues are a domestic problem.


Pakistan distances itself from extradition to India of 2008 Mumbai attacks’ suspect

Updated 10 April 2025
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Pakistan distances itself from extradition to India of 2008 Mumbai attacks’ suspect

  • Foreign office says Tahawwur Hussain Rana was Canadian, had not renewed Pakistani origin documents in decades
  • 64-year-old is accused of being in LeT group, planning four-day Mumbai siege in which 160 people were killed in 2008

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan on Thursday distanced itself from the issue of the extradition to India of Tahawwur Hussain Rana, a suspect in the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks, saying he was a Canadian national who had not renewed his Pakistani origin documents in the past two decades.
New Delhi accuses Rana, 64, of being a member of the Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), or the Army of the Pure, a group blamed by India and the United States for the four-day Mumbai siege in which 160 people, including Americans and other foreigners, were killed in 2008. Rana is accused of assisting his friend David Coleman Headley who was sentenced to 35 years in a US prison after pleading guilty to aiding LeT militants and scouting target locations in Mumbai.
Pakistan has always denied official complicity in the Mumbai attacks.
“On the Tahawwur Rana issue, we have conveyed our position regarding his Canadian nationality,” Foreign Office spokesperson Shafqat Ali Khan said in reply to a question during a weekly media briefing.
 “As far as our record indicates, he did not even apply for renewal for his Pakistani origin documents for the last two decades …I reiterate the position that we will give further updates in due course.”
In February, US President Donald Trump announced the extradition of Rana, calling him “one of the very evil people in the world.”
The US Supreme Court rejected Rana’s plea in February to remain in the country, where he was serving a sentence for planning another LeT-linked attack. 
According to a Reuters report, Rana, a former Pakistan Army doctor, immigrated to Canada in 1997 before moving to Chicago to set up businesses. He was arrested by US authorities in 2009, a year after the Mumbai attacks. 
In 2013, a US court acquitted him of conspiring in the Mumbai attacks but sentenced him to 14 years for plotting an attack on the Jyllands-Posten newspaper office in Denmark, which had published blasphemous caricatures of the Holy Prophet (Peace Be Upon Him).
Media has reported that Rana and Headley knew each other from boarding school days in Pakistan. Headley testified as a witness at Rana’s trial, claiming he used Rana’s immigration services business as a cover to scout targets in India. 
Rana admitted to visiting Mumbai before the attacks and staying at the luxury Taj Mahal Palace Hotel, which became the focal point of the deadly siege. However, he denied any involvement in the conspiracy.


Pakistan to seek fresh bids for national airline, says adviser

Updated 10 April 2025
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Pakistan to seek fresh bids for national airline, says adviser

  • Pakistan has been looking to offload a 51-100% stake in debt-ridden PIA
  • Attempt to privatize PIA last year fell flat when Pakistan got only one bid

ISLAMABAD: The Pakistani government will seek fresh expressions of interest for the sale of Pakistan International Airlines later this month, a government adviser said on Thursday, two days after PIA reported its first annual profit in over two decades.
Pakistan has been looking to offload a 51-100 percent stake in debt-ridden PIA, part of an effort to raise funds and reform cash-bleeding state-owned enterprises as envisaged under a $7 billion International Monetary Fund program.
However, Islamabad’s attempt to privatize PIA last year fell flat when it received only a single offer, well below the asking price of more than $300 million.
Pakistan has offloaded almost all of the national carrier’s legacy debt and shifted it to government books after bidders raised issues that had led to the failed attempt, according to the privatization ministry.
“In our last attempt to privatise PIA, pre-qualified bidders had some issues with taxation and the balance sheet. Those are taken care of now,” Muhammad Ali, government adviser on privatization, told Reuters. “We plan to publish the new Expression of Interest (EoI) by the last week of April 2025,” he said.
The government plans to complete the airline’s privatization before the end of this year.
“We are also revising the pre-qualification criteria,” he said, adding that the reference price could also be revised keeping in view the latest accounts and changes in the balance sheet.
Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif last year announced plans to sell all SOEs.
The adviser said that the process to privatise power distribution companies had also started, terming it a “high priority transaction.”
He said some companies previously due to be sold in the second phase were being pushed into the first phase.
The adviser said the government had appointed Jones Lang LaSalle to advise on exploring different sales options for the PIA-owned Roosevelt hotel building in Manhattan, New York. They include selling the building as it is or opting for a joint venture with a top tier developer, which has the potential to generate proceeds five times higher, Ali said.