The Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and other extremist organisations, active in the border regions of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa for many months, are allegedly involved in an elaborate extortion racket that has impacted almost everything from local businesses, agriculture, government projects, non-governmental socio-welfare projects, and even political and social personalities. Officials and experts estimate that the extortion and smuggling network is netting the extremists several billion rupees every month, which has sustained their activities in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Since the TTP has been collecting this money in cash while controlling border areas and smuggling routes, its transportation to subordinates and affiliates on both sides of the border is fairly easy. Since victims are threatened into silence - even if the victims are government contractors - no formal record of the quantum of the racket exists. Not even the intelligence agencies and law enforcement forces have an exact idea of its scale. However, based on background interviews with victims, police officers, intelligence officials and journalists, the picture pieced together suggests that it is substantive enough to fund a small army.
A recently published report by the United Nations stated that Afghanistan has become a safe haven for the Pakistani Taliban. The UN estimated that there were more than 6,000 militants and or their families who live in Afghanistan. At the same time, a substantial number of Pakistani Taliban or their families (numbering in the thousands) live in Pakistan, the report said. The TTP looks after the economic well-being of these thousands of people on both sides of the Durand Line through the funds raised by their elaborate extortion network.
If it involves big money, the TTP get involved
Interviews and discussions with current and former law enforcement personnel, victims, politicians and journalists across the length of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) show that the TTP have extended their tentacles into several border areas of the province, which straddle Afghanistan. Establishing their control over old and new cross-border smuggling routes, the TTP leveraged this access and their propensity for unbridled violence to regulate illicit cross-border trade and as a staging ground to slowly enhance and entrench their reign of terror.
Living off the land, the TTP and other extremist outfits cast their dark shadow on any and all centres which were flush with cash or even had the possibility of access to significant money. It did not matter to them whether these centres were legitimate, official centres or if they were illegitimate.
Drugs cash cow
The border district of Khyber (formerly known as Khyber Agency) was once a major stronghold for the TTP. But after multiple, high-intensity military operations, the area was said to have been purged of terrorists. Until it wasn't.
Khyber is famous for drugs and for being a major centre for the large-scale cultivation of opium and hashish. Even though the drug trade is criminalised in Pakistan, it continues to flourish in the border areas, registering significant year-on-year growth in multiple categories. This illicit drug trade, whether domestic production or smuggled imports from neighbouring Afghanistan, became a cash cow for the TTP.
Officials of intelligence agencies and local journalists agree that TTP's revenue from this district is unmatched. They claim that the extremists extort as much as 20% to 30% from major drug producers or dealers in the district.
An intelligence official, who refused to be identified for this article, said that the TTP imposed a tax of Rs5,000 on every kilogramme of hashish produced/trafficked through the district. However, he added that compared to homegrown drugs, most of the drugs in Pakistan come from Afghanistan. While some blame the porous border for the mass proliferation of drugs in the country, the intelligence officer said that the border areas are controlled by the TTP, who 'regulate' drug smuggling. TTP, he said, protect and permit the proliferation of drugs for their ulterior motives.
Forget writ, the government is a victim
Intelligence agencies and other relevant law enforcement forces, who are tracking the activities of the TTP and other extremist groups in the region, believe these outfits have even put the government in their sights. Contractors working on government-sponsored projects in the tribal merged districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (the erstwhile federally administered tribal area-FATA), especially North Waziristan, South Waziristan, Frontier Region (FR) Lakki, some areas in the southern districts of Lakki Marwat, Dera Ismail Khan, Bannu, as well as the border districts of Mohmand and Bajaur are believed to be paying anywhere from 5%, up to 15% in extortion to the TTP. Even though these contractors work for the government, they have been tight-lipped about the quantum and frequency of the payments -whether weekly, monthly, or per the value of the contract.
The power wielded by extremist outfits compels these contractors to keep paying the TTP and to keep silent about it. Should any contractor refuse to pay this 'tax,' they quickly discover how impossible it is to continue working in that area. Sources in the KP government claimed that since they cannot provide complete security to contractors working on provincial or federal government projects worth billions of rupees, the contractors pay their local TTP commander to ensure their security.
This is affecting government projects, some of which are worth billions, being built in these areas, impeding development.
It is pertinent to note that the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam Fazl (JUI-F) chief, Maulana Fazlur Rehman, recently claimed that 15% in extortion is being paid to the TTP in the name of development projects.
Mining extortion
Government data shows there are around 400 mineral mines and marble factories in the northern border districts of Mohmand and Bajaur. Locals say owners of most of these factories are forced to pay the TTP. Should they fail to comply, they can expect an explosive wake up call.
Recently, a factory owner refused to pay the monthly 'tax'. The next day, the factory was bombed, while the factory owner was 'banned' from entering his newly built house.
Two former District Police Officers (DPOs) who served in Mohmand and Bajaur districts, who spoke to Naya Daur on the condition of anonymity, said the minerals and precious stones-rich region is dotted with mines. These mines are estimated to generate revenues worth billions of rupees per month.
The former police officers claimed to have received confirmed reports that several militant groups were active in the region and were allegedly extorting heavy sums from mine owners and those involved in the mineral trade, with monthly payments running into tens of millions. Sometimes even billions of rupees.
Extortion pine nuts
Senior journalist Rasool Dawar, who closely monitors terrorism in the region, said North Waziristan generates billions of rupees annually from cultivating the Chilghoza pine nuts - considered to be among the most expensive variety of nuts/dry fruit found in Pakistan. Like other areas of the province, a large part of the income generated from the sale of pine nuts goes to the TTP.
Dawar explained that the extortion money is collected daily and can amount to tens of millions of rupees.
But it is not just agriculture-based businesses that suffer at the hands of the TTP. When leaders of a social welfare organisation in North Waziristan refused to pay extortion money to the TTP, a school they were building in the war-torn district was destroyed.
Prosecution problems
An official of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Counter-Terrorism Department (CTD) - which was set up to tackle the rising influence of terror outfits - said that they were shocked to learn about the activities of an extremist group - the Ghat Haji Group - which was active in Dera Ismail Khan. The official, who insisted on speaking on the condition of anonymity given the security risks of speaking out, said they discovered that the Ghat Haji Group had allegedly extorted some Rs25 billion in just two years from the district.
Based on these reports, the official said they conducted an investigation, laid down a dragnet and conducted several operations in the district, resulting in several arrests. The official, however, added that another surprise was waiting for them when they took these suspects to court. Instead of sending these suspects on either physical or judicial remand, as is the norm for the first presentation of suspects before the court after arrest, the official said the court chose to release all the suspects. They later learnt that the courts had released these suspects because the TTP had threatened the concerned court staff and their close relatives with serious harm unless their fellows were immediately released.
Another officer of a law enforcement agency, who has worked in the erstwhile tribal areas, said they detained two businessmen in Bannu and DI Khan on suspicion of facilitating terrorists. During investigations, they found out that the suspects had bought medicines and electronic goods in Pakistan worth billions before sending them across to Afghanistan on the pretext of legitimate businesses, but they were instead extortion payments in kind.
Targeting the source
One way the Pakistani government has been attempting to combat the growing influence of the TTP is to target a major source of their economic wealth, the illicit drug trade.
A senior official of the Excise and Narcotics Control Department of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government told Naya Daur that they had conducted joint anti-narcotics operations together with the police in the Khyber district. But this had a chilling culmination. Their operations against drug dealers and smugglers incensed the TTP, who had promised safety and security to them. The terror outfit retaliated by threatening each and every official of the excise and narcotics control department by name, the official said.
The official said that on the one hand, they were facing difficulties in stemming the tide of narcotics flowing through the district as the government struggled to equip them with the basic facilities necessary to do their jobs, while on the other, they were being targeted by terrorists. As a result, he said the department had severely limited its footprint and scope of operations in the area.
He added that smuggling routes in Kurram, North Waziristan, South Waziristan, Dera Ismail Khan, Bajaur, and Mohmand are being actively used for smuggling narcotics, among other goods. Attempts to stop this activity, he claimed, had led to the fatal gun attack on several customs officials a few weeks ago in DI Khan. The attack, he lamented, has made smuggling on this route very easy at night.
Govt policy at fault
Veteran politician and Awami National Party's (ANP) Provincial President Mian Iftikhar Hussain said that during the tenure of the previous Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf government, around 35,000 extremists and terrorists were brought in from Afghanistan and settled in the border areas of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Among these, Hussain claimed, were many who were involved in over two dozen attacks on the ANP. This was the major reason why, Hussain said, members of the TTP today were extorting people in a systematic way in the southern districts of the province. He lamented that the government was not paying any heed to this alarming situation.
He said that if the National Action Plan had been implemented in letter and spirit, there would have been no need to launch a new operation under the moniker of Azm-e-Istehkam.
However, he made it clear that if the incumbent government talks about launching a new military operation in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa at the US' request, it will not be allowed under any circumstances.
Meanwhile, Dawar claimed to have received information from credible sources that certain prominent political figures and businesspeople were paying extortion to the TTP in the southern districts of KP, major centres such as Peshawar, Mardan and many other areas of the province. However, he stopped short of naming them since the activities of these individuals were not yet publicly known. According to Dawar's sources, the TTP also extort prominent philanthropists in these areas. In fact, he claimed that you will be hard-pressed to find people who have money but have yet to pay extortion to the TTP.