Don’t Blame Afghanistan for Peshawar Attack, Take Care of Your Problems: Taliban to Pak | Exclusive

Pakistan should take care of its own problems and stop blaming Afghanistan for the Peshawar mosque attack on Monday that killed more than 100 people, Afghan Taliban Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqqi said at a press conference.

The suicide bombing was the deadliest in a decade to hit Peshawar, a restive northwestern city near the Afghan border. The bomber struck as hundreds of worshippers gathered for noon prayers in a mosque that was built for the police and their families living in a highly fortified area.

“In 20 years, we have not seen such a bomb or a suicide jacket that blew up the roof of the mosque and hundreds of people along with it. Therefore, this incident should be thoroughly investigated,” he said.

Muttaqi added that Afghanistan should not be held responsible for Pakistan?s internal problems.

The minister also refuted Pakistan’s claims of his country being the epicentre of terrorism. “If someone says that Afghanistan was the centre of it, then the terrorism would have also reached Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan and Iran. Yet that is not the case.”

“Afghanistan today is at peace with other neighboring countries and that proves that there is no such thing as Afghanistan being the epicentre,” he said.

THE INVESTIGATION

Pakistan Police investigating the suicide bombing said on Tuesday that several people had been arrested, and they could not rule out the possibility that the bomber had internal assistance evading security checks.

?We have found some excellent clues, and based on these clues we have made some major arrests,? Peshawar Police Chief Ijaz Khan told Reuters.

?We can?t rule out internal assistance but as the investigation is still in progress, I will not be able to share more details.?

Investigators, who include counter-terrorism and intelligence officials, are focusing on how the attacker managed to breach the military and police checkpoints leading into the Police Lines district, a colonial-era, self-contained encampment in the city centre that is home to middle- and lower-ranking police personnel and their families.

Defence Minister Khawaja Asif had said the bomber was in the first row in the prayer hall when he struck. Remains of the attacker have been recovered, provincial Police Chief Moazzam Jah Ansari told Reuters. ?We believe the attackers are not an organised group,? he added.

RESPONSIBILITY

The most active militant group in the area, the Pakistani Taliban, also called Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), has denied responsibility for the attack, which no group has claimed so far. Interior Minister Rana Sanaullah had told parliament a breakaway faction of the TTP was to blame.

The blast demolished the upper storey of the mosque. It was the deadliest attack in Peshawar since twin suicide bombings at All Saints Church killed scores of worshippers in September 2013.

Peshawar sits on the edge of the Pashtun tribal lands, a region mired in violence for the past two decades.

The TTP is an umbrella group for Sunni and sectarian Islamist factions opposed to the government in Islamabad. The group has recently stepped up attacks against police.

With PTI Inputs

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