PESHAWAR, March 13: Pakistani Taliban were regrouping in Peshawar and tribal areas to counter the impact of the security forces’ crackdown on them, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Information Minister Mian Iftikhar Hussain said here on Tuesday.

During the Khyber Union of Journalists and Peshawar Press Club oath-taking ceremony at the Chief Minister’s House here, the minister said the talks between US and Afghan Taliban had led to a deep split within the Pakistani Taliban.

“The growing desire among Pakistani Taliban for holding talks with the government has created serious differences among the terror outfit. Due to these differences, the Taliban leadership recently sacked their spokesman, Maulvi Faqir Mohammad, for openly supporting the idea of dialogue with the government,” he said.

Mr Iftikhar urged Pakistan, Afghanistan and the US to form a joint team for meaningful dialogue with Taliban leaders to achieve desired goals of peace in the region.

“The experience of holding talks with Taliban separately by Pakistan, Afghanistan and the US miserably failed in the past. Even the recent US efforts to gain positive outcome from the Qatar moot is not going to deliver the goods,” he said.

The minister said the only way out to restore peace in the region lied in holding joint dialogue by Pakistan, Afghanistan and the US with the Taliban and that if it failed, then effective action had to be taken to eliminate them completely.

“We have faced them and rooted them out and will continue doing so,” he said.

Mr Iftikhar said the recent Peshawar bomb blast was a reaction of operations in Orakzai Agency and Darra Adamkhel and Bara Tehsil of Khyber Agency, where security forces cleared many strategic areas.

He said sectarianism was another reason of terrorist acts in the provincial capital.

He said terrorists wouldn’t be unable to continue with acts of terrorism due to the government’s effective plan to crack down on them.

The minister said there should be no good and bad Taliban and they all should be eliminated without discrimination to save the country.

He said no segment of the society had escaped from the Taliban’s actions and therefore, the society should take them head on.

He said the government had planned to take action against militants in tribal and settled areas simultaneously by giving powers of supervision to the relevant commissioners.

Mr Iftikhar said in the past whenever political administrations of tribal areas initiated action, terrorists fled to settled areas of the province but they won’t be able to escape anymore.

He said the government had hit anti-state elements hard and the war against them would continue until their complete elimination. He said the issue needed to be resolved on permanent basis.

Meanwhile, the information minister told reporters here that Awami National Party was a coalition partner of Pakistan People’s Party and would continue supporting its leader President Asif Zardari.

He said ANP would always remember the way in which President Zardari supported ANP over the last four years, especially during difficult times.

The minister said his party had supported PPP and Zardari ‘honestly and unconditionally’ and would continue doing so.

He said the ANP-PPP coalition government would complete its five years term in office. He, however, said the next general elections would be held at an appropriate time.

Mr Iftikhar said the provincial government always wanted to hold local government elections but security situation didn’t let it do it.

He said since the law and order situation had improved, local government elections would be held ahead of general elections. — Bureau/APP