New Study Paper: The Resurgence of the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP)
June 20, 2022
The background of the TTP’s organizational emergence is linked to the support Pakistan provided to militant factions in Afghanistan during the Afghan-Soviet War and the Afghan Civil War. Under the military regime of Zia ul-Haq, Pakistan emerged as a major State sponsor for terrorist outfits in South Asia from the late 1970s onwards, initially supporting various mujahideen factions in Afghanistan before eventually focusing its support on the Taliban, which primarily recruited its fighters from the Afghan refugee population in Pakistan. A Pakistan-friendly Taliban regime in Kabul, it was assumed in Islamabad, would provide Pakistan with strategic depth vis-à-vis India.
