Pakistani Taliban

Pakistani Taliban, formally Tehreek-e Taliban Pakistan or Tehrik-i Taliban Pakistan (TTP), militant group that formed about 2007 to counter Pakistani government rule in Pashtun-inhabited regions of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province in northwestern Pakistan. Like the unaffiliated Afghan Taliban, with which it shares ethnic, cultural, and ideological ties, the Pakistani Taliban combines a traditional Pashtun social code (Pashtunwali) with the strict religious puritanism of the Deoband school of Islam. The group emerged during the Afghanistan War (2001–14) in response to Pakistan Army operations in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA; now part of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa), a region where local tribes had previously enjoyed considerable autonomy. Those operations sought to secure the border region against militants fleeing Afghanistan. The TTP targets Pakistani security personnel and installations, typically in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, with acts of terrorism. The group is notorious internationally for its 2012 assassination attempt against Malala Yousafzai, an activist against the group’s prohibition on girls’ education, and the Peshawar school massacre in 2014, in which it stormed an army-run school in Peshawar and killed 150 people.

Formation and leadership history

The TTP was created in late 2007 by Baitullah Mehsud, a militant commander sympathetic to the Deoband school of Islam and whose Mehsud tribe in South Waziristan had been a dominant force among the region’s militant networks for several generations. Mehsud had been one of the major insurgents against the army in FATA and had previously concluded a short-lived ceasefire with the government in 2005. The formation of the TTP brought together militant groups from across FATA and parts of the North-West Frontier Province (the name of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa until 2010) under Mehsud’s command. Its founding objectives included resistance to NATO forces and the Pakistan Army, enforcement of a Deobandi interpretation of Islamic law, and the cessation of military activity in FATA and the Swat district of the North-West Frontier Province.

Mehsud was killed in 2009, and his successor, Hakimullah Mehsud, a fellow tribesman, was killed in 2013. The appointment of a commander outside the Mehsud tribe, Mullah Fazlullah, created discord within the TTP. Many disaffected members, inspired by the rapid expansion of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) in 2014–15, pledged allegiance to ISIS and formed the Islamic State–Khorasan Province (ISKP or ISIS-K), a group dedicated to a transnational jihad and hostile toward the TTP and the Afghan Taliban. In 2018 Fazlullah was killed, and leadership was returned to the Mehsud tribe with the appointment of Noor Wali Mehsud as commander.

Resurgence in the 2020s

Under Noor Wali Mehsud the TTP’s membership stabilized, and it became more closely aligned with the Afghan Taliban in both its structure and objectives, reportedly facilitating the flow of support between the organizations. After the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan in 2021 and the Afghan Taliban’s return to power in the country, TTP activity in Pakistan saw a sharp resurgence, with the number of attacks reportedly increasing from fewer than 200 in 2021 to more than 600 in 2024. In January 2023, a suicide bombing on a police compound in Peshawar killed more than 80 people during Friday prayers, shaking public confidence in the ability of Pakistan’s security apparatus. The dramatic rise led Pakistan to blame the Afghan Taliban for allowing the TTP to operate in Afghanistan, an accusation the Afghan Taliban denies. In October 2025 the Pakistan Army, emboldened by a warming relationship with the United States and a new military pact with Saudi Arabia, launched an air strike on Kabul in an alleged attempt to target Noor Wali Mehsud. The attack prompted the ruling Afghan Taliban to retaliate against the strike on Afghanistan’s capital, leading to a direct confrontation between the Pakistan Army and the Afghan Taliban.