ISLAMABAD: Social media videos that surfaced on Monday appeared to show a hostage reportedly held by Pakistani Taliban (TTP) insurgents, making an appeal to authorities for a peaceful resolution to an ongoing standoff since prisoners associated with the TTP seized control of a jail in the country's northwest a day earlier.
In a statement released on Sunday, the TTP group said prisoners had taken “several military officers and jail staff” hostage at the Counterterrorism Department (CTD) jail in the northwestern town of Bannu in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.
A spokesperson for the KP government told media the facility had been surrounded and an operation launched to take back control of the building would be “completed soon.” He denied the jail had been infiltrated but said prisoners there on Saturday snatched weapons from interrogators and helped release other inmates.
In a video being circulated on social media, a person who identified himself as a hostage could be heard confirming that he and others officials had been detained inside the jail. He did not specify how many detainees there were.
“We appeal to people that the issue be resolved peacefully and we have requested the Taliban to avoid firing or use of force,” the man, who did not identify himself, can be seen saying in the video that showed at least two men carrying guns standing guard by a group of men.
Mohammad Ali Saif, a spokesman for the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provincial government, told Reuters authorities had opened talks to try to resolve the standoff with the militants.
He said the authorities had not yet received a response from the Pakistani Taliban, but relatives of the militants and tribal elders from the area had also been involved in initiating talks.
Police stand guard along a road they blocked after Taliban militants seized a police station in Bannu on December 19, 2022. (AFP)
At least one counter-terrorism official was killed by the militants, Saif told Reuters, who according to authorities had snatched weapons off their guards while under interrogation.
Several significant TTP members were present at the centre, the spokesman added. He did not say how many security personnel were being held hostage. An intelligence officer told Reuters, however, that there were six hostages - four from the military and two from counter-terrorism.
The hostage situation came a day after the TTP claimed the killings of four policemen in the nearby district of Lakki Marwat.
Pakistan has been fighting an insurgency by the TTP, which associates itself with Afghanistan’s Taliban. The Taliban regime in Afghanistan had been trying to broker talks between the Pakistani government and the TTP, which broke down earlier this year when the group called off a ceasefire and vowed to restart attacks.
In its statement on Sunday, the TTP rejected media reports that prisoners were seeking safe passage to Afghanistan, saying the demand was to shift them to tribal areas in North or South Waziristan. The banned outfit said the government had not given a “positive response” in return.
“The only way to save the army personnel and prison staff taken hostage is to accept the prisoners’ demands and let them go to North or South Waziristan,” the Pakistani Taliban warned.
Bannu district sits just outside North Waziristan, a tribal region bordering Afghanistan that has long been a safe haven for militants.
Pakistan's military has conducted several offensives in the tribal regions since 2009, forcing militants and their leadership to run into neighbouring Afghan districts where Islamabad says they set up training centres to plan and launch attacks inside Pakistan. Kabul denies the charge.
