'Face Us If You're A Man': Pakistani Taliban's Open Threat To Asim Munir

A string of videos released by the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) has put Pakistan's army chief, Field Marshal Asim Munir, in a spot. The videos feature a top TTP commander threatening Munir, claiming that the Pakistani army should avoid sending soldiers to get killed and instead, top officers should lead themselves to the battlefield.

The videos include battlefield footage of an October 8 ambush in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa's Kurram, in which the TTP claims 22 Pakistani soldiers were killed and shows captured ammunition and vehicles. Pakistan's official accounts have so far recorded fewer casualties: the army acknowledged 11 soldiers killed in the attack.

In one clip, a senior TTP figure identified by Pakistani officials as Commander Kazim appears on camera and says, "Face us if you are a man." In the same video, Kazim then goes on to say, "Fight us if you have had your mother's milk." On October 21, Pakistani authorities announced a reward of 10 crore Pakistani rupees (PKR) for information leading to the capture of Kazim. 

After days of cross-border shelling, air strikes and tit-for-tat exchanges that cost civilian lives on both sides, Pakistan and the Taliban-led authorities in Kabul agreed to an immediate ceasefire mediated by Qatar and Turkey in mid-October. The ceasefire was announced publicly in Doha and framed as a necessary step to stop the escalation along the porous Durand Line. But Islamabad has been at pains to say the truce will only hold if Afghanistan cracks down on armed groups that operate from Afghan soil in a clear reference to the TTP. 

Pakistani media reports warn that the TTP's battlefield successes have emboldened other violent outfits. Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ), the Islamic State Khorasan Province (ISKP), and splinter groups such as Jaish-e-Mohammad all watch the trajectory closely. The LeJ has a history of sectarian terror inside Pakistan, targeting minority communities, while ISKP has previously attracted disgruntled fighters from TTP ranks. 

As TTP attacks have escalated in recent weeks, the rising violence exposes the Pakistan Army's failure to keep the insurgency under check and to have a counter-strategy or governance plan in troubled KPK.